Delirium Trigger
by Solain Rhyo
Summary: Garrus has made no secret of his desire for Shepard; as much as she wants him in return, there's still the small matter of saving humanity from the Collectors standing in their way.  FemShep/Garrus.  Rated for sexual content.
1. Sewn and Silent

**_Disclaimer: _**_I own nothing. It all belongs to Bioware / EA._

**.1.**

**-Sewn and Silent-**

**.x. **

I remember it all when I dream.

I am adrift in a silently insidious expanse, an all encompassing nether-sea. I am unable to stop my body from moving without the constraints of gravity; my trajectory is seemingly aimless but Fate has, underhandedly, already charted my destination. I am captivated in the moments that follow by what I see; my heart is drumming rapidly, a steady thunder that I can feel though terrifying hyper-awareness in every minute particle of my being.

Through my visor, I watch as the Normandy disintegrates into glinting fragments while devastating threads of light weave a complex pattern between them. It is an oddly beautiful image, made somehow more so against the backdrop of the planet Alchera, against the delicate spattering of stars and galaxies that I am now lost in. I watch as the Normandy succumbs at last to the final attack, as what very little is left of her is shrouded and wreathed in a daedal dance of fire. I close my eyes and twist aside as best I can, a futile attempt to protect myself from the imminent blast-wave. I know in that fraction of a second that it will do no good, that I am as lost as the Normandy, but that terrible crystallized thought cannot stop me from hoping, from praying, from fiercely _willing_ my own survival.

I'm caught then in the energy of the aftermath, flung further in a graceless and accelerated tumble. All that has transpired has done so in an eerie silence, all sound stolen by the selfish vacuum I flounder so helplessly throughout. This sequence of events, seemingly lasting hours, has been prolonged by my great and immeasurable fear—a span as long as one breath to another is all that has passed. It is as I draw my next breath that I realize my surviving the destruction of the Normandy was not sheer luck, oh no—it has only been another part of the merciless endgame of Fate.

In this helmet that I have so often thought of as suffocating, it is becoming difficult to breathe.

The knowledge is swift, bone-liquifying in its terrible clarity. I reach around to fumble blindly at the small hose that supplies me with breathable oxygen. I feel the pressure of escaping gas pushing against my gloved fingers and I know what dire futures this foretells.

There is a rupture in my air supply.

I try to stem the leak with my fingers. I am fighting on numerous levels, now: fighting to force my lungs into finding and using the last dregs of air, fighting to stop that same precious gas from venting into pitiless space, fighting to ignore the fact that Alchera, glowing with a harsh yet ethereal light of the palest blue, is steadily and quickly growing closer.

Heartbeats. Still so loud to me as the only sound, so ominous, in this frightening splinter of reality I've been cast into. I cannot breathe. My lungs, my bones, my very blood begins to smolder. I am still wheeling through that which I used to see as peaceful, wondrous and mysterious, but the canvas of distant glittering stars and the luminous swirls of galaxies has incited within me now nothing but the most primal of despair.

Another revolution of my body and I see again Alchera, such a vividly stunning image, beckoning me downwards to experience its cold and harsh splendor. I close my eyes as my entire being ignites with a pain I could not have, until now, ever have fathomed. I have entered the planet's atmosphere. I will plummet to the earth, a shooting star with a soul, and burn with the intensity of every meteor ever seen by those who devoutly watch the night sky to make their earnest wishes.

I am burning. I cannot breathe.

My mouth opens then in a voiceless, empty exhale, a final and futile plea to the shining worlds shrinking behind me, a silent scream of rage sucked into the endless, consuming void.

**.x.**

I didn't wake abruptly from the dream. It wasn't the last vestiges of my own cries that had thrown me from slumber to sudden and disquieting reality. It had been the memory of that silence, in my final seconds above Alchera, that affectless, all-enveloping silence that had stifled my breath and my voice and my life. It prompted a reaction within me that I hated more than anything.

It terrified me.

Miranda had worried that, upon my premature awakening from a rebirth that had taken two-years, the abbreviated tests they'd conducted upon me to ascertain I'd returned mentally stable had been insufficient. She was right. Had they further delved into the question of my sanity after the trauma of having died and been reconstructed, they would have realized that the new Shepard—the _improved_ Shepard—housed within her a fear so intrinsic and profound that it was a wonder I wasn't huddled in the corner, a mumbling and paranoid wreck.

Nobody had asked me the question that I knew was furiously alight within their minds. It was visible in their eyes whenever they found themselves facing me. It wasn't for worry of being rude that they refrained from letting the words slip past their lips—no, it was their uncertainty of how I'd respond to their inquiry as to what had happened to me after I died. Such a grave question. Such a crucial question, such an integral part of the hopes and dreams of so many. I wouldn't have answered even had they been able to ask.

_Nothingness_, I could have told them. _Oblivion_. An existential rift devoid of anything and absent of everything. I didn't die and simply pass into another plane to live on again in another heavenly, celestial form. I had simply ceased to be.

This, and the silence of my dream-state recollections—I was afraid now. I was always afraid. But I was Shepard, and I had returned from the clutches of the afterlife, reformed by the trials of my demise, to rise again stronger and triumphant.

Or such was the role scripted for me to play.

All this, I reflected on in the minutes that passed since I'd opened my eyes to escape that abhorrent silence. And when Joker's voice came over my personal comm to alert me that we'd arrived at Omega, I was relieved at the reminder that I had a purpose, something to drive and distract me. I cast off my single blanket and rose to my feet, raising my arms over my head and locking my hands together as I stretched. I winced as muscles I hadn't even known I'd had made known their complaints; I had still not healed entirely from my reconstruction. I lowered my arms, inhaled deeply, and made a pointed effort to cast away the lingering remains of the dream before padding across the floor of my cabin to the shower.

This was the day I would begin to build my team, to find people I could trust not only with my life, but with that of so many others as well. I would try to recruit people who would be willing to risk their own lives in this impossible quest while at the same time, recruit people to replace those I'd lost and loved. It was a tall order, for how many individuals, after hearing how grand the scale of our mission, would be eager to sign on?

Hopefully, I mused as I stepped beneath the almost-painful, needle-like spray of hot water, the answer to that question would be the two people I would approach today: the vigilante Archangel and the doctor, Mordin Solus.

**.x.**

Garrus was alive.

The gamut of emotions that coursed through me upon realizing the fierce and solitary Archangel was in fact my old friend was nearly crippling in its intensity. Simple and unadulterated joy was foremost, happiness to see someone I related to that period of time I now thought of as Before. Surprise, of course—I hadn't even considered the possibility that the infamous rebel and Garrus could be one and the same. And then relief, because now I had someone I could trust, someone who didn't regard me as a figurehead, or a construct, or some miracle who'd managed to cheat Death.

I nearly choked over his name when he removed his helmet and revealed himself to Miranda, Jacob and myself; so familiar that angular face and the long tapered points of his crest, the precise blue facial markings and those intense, ever-luminous eyes. I was then grateful that I'd worn a visor, for the tell-tale shimmer of tears in my own eyes would have been instantly apparent otherwise. The fact that I was so emotional was disconcerting, but then again, I'd been all over the map in terms of feelings since my rebirth. I swallowed hard against the knot of emotion in my throat, and moved on to asking the pertinent questions.

As he told me his path in the two years since I'd died, I found myself clenching and unclenching my hands. The desire to go to him and touch and simply hold onto him was damn near overwhelming. It wasn't an urge that stemmed from secretly harbored designs for romance; it was a more basic longing, to feel that which was real, that which was familiar, to have beneath my hands something concrete that I could use as an anchor. Garrus was my tether, my link to the old Shepard, that person I could vividly remember and claim to have been. But I wasn't that person, not anymore. In Garrus' sudden reappearance I had found—I hoped—some kind of deliverance from the fear I had of stepping into the role of a Shepard that didn't yet feel real to me.

Our plan of action to escape was too soon put into action. Together the four of us decimated the first few waves sent in against us. When the mercenaries began to attempt entry from the basement level, I left Miranda with Garrus and Jacob and I raced down to the lowest levels. Our mission to seal the doors there successful, we made our way top-side once again. Throughout this entire ordeal I was buoyed by an odd sense of jubilation, the cause being the unexpected discovery of Garrus. I felt more confident, more stable and safe, than I had since Miranda's disembodied voice had awoken me back on that space station.

Garrus' voice came over the comm suddenly, letting me know that part of the Blood Pack merc group-and more importantly, its leader-had found them on the floor above. I doubled my pace, taking the stairs two at a time, taking the corner in a controlled skid and hurtling towards the open-windowed room where Garrus and Miranda had remained; a sudden series of shots rang out, followed by an exuberant bellow I knew from past experience to be Garrus' victory cry. I smiled. The Blood Pack was no longer a problem. I slowed a bit with that realization as behind me Jacob crouched low with heavy pistol in hand at the railing to ensure we hadn't been followed. I entered the topmost room, prepared to to announce that the mercs on the lower levels had been dealt with, and stopped dead in my tracks.

_I'd already died once._

This was the thought I held onto in that span of a mere few heartbeats as I stood with my assault rifle cradled tightly within my arms and blinked once, twice, to assimilate what it was I seeing. Garrus, with his eye aligned to the sight of his sniper rifle, whirling about as the Blue Suns gunship rose into view just outside the window. I knew, just as he did, what was about to happen; his attention had been diverted for just a half-second, long enough to make it a crucial and deadly error. I'd strayed too long from the room, intent on obliterating the last of the mercs as they'd tried to run for cover—a foolish and amateur error on my behalf, one I was about to intensely regret. And now, in a span of seconds that seemed to be caught in some type of inexplicable, slowing fetters, I watched the realization ripple across Garrus' turian features even as he made the choice to raise his rifle, sight it, and squeeze the trigger—

I'd already died once. And so I launched myself at him, struck him full-body from the side. I was no Vanguard, but I was now in possession of an impressive array of cybernetic implants, and I mustered enough force in that short, propelling burst to send him sprawling in an uncontrollable tumble over the arm of one of the many chairs that littered the room. I think he shouted something as he fell, as he twisted about to see just what had struck him, as he realized it was _me_—but my ears then heard only the roar of the gunship's main weapon.

_This is really going to hurt_, my brain helpfully supplied in those moments that seemed to still be suspended in a slowed current. Beryllium and tungsten plated armor had been more than sufficient in numerous firefights against mercs or vorcha, but this was a large-caliber cannon I was facing, and my flashy ERCS gear just wasn't up to par. All this I had known the moment I'd chosen to shove Garrus aside and take the attack meant for him, but the difference between that knowledge and the sudden, unavoidable, terrifying realization of just what I was about to experience more than enough to make me issue a fervent, quicksilver prayer to anyone listening that maybe this wouldn't go down the way I thought it would.

Facing the gunship in that flash of a second that followed, I was rendered suddenly immobile; in my mind, I was back in space above Alchera, unable to breathe, aflame while around me there was only that heavy and impenetrable blanket of mind-numbing silence—

Time snapped back into flow. I tried to get out of the line of fire. I managed a quarter-turn and a lunging step before the linear spray of bullets tore into me. They chewed their way up my leg, grazed my side, punched through my shoulder and I know the sound I heard then—warped and deepened by the intricate convolutions of time caught within agony—was my own raw scream. Even then I managed to twist around, stumble forwards and nearly collapse as the whole of my weight came down on my wounded leg. I had thought then that I might make it, that I could topple forwards and be safely behind the cover provided by the wall. It was an erroneous assumption. My brain interpreted the sound of heavy artillery being fired too late, and the blast exploded the floor at my feet before I could complete my dive for safety.

What happened then, I can't be sure. Pain of course, the type that consumes you in an unrelenting onslaught and causes reality to ripple in and out of your awareness. Noises persisted in tumultuous disharmony all around me but it was too hard to focus on what they meant.

"Shepard!"

At least I think that's what I heard. They syllables were all there—it _sounded _like my name, but I was still riding the unsteady ebb and flow of suffering and confusion. I was going to die, _again_. But even in the haze coating my mind, I knew that this wasn't like last time. There was fear, yes, but it wasn't the abject terror I'd known as I'd began to fall to Alchera. This time was different. This time, I wasn't alone.

"Shep—" More voices, distorted as though by Doppler Effect. Eventually I could distinguish one noise from amongst the tangled knot of others, could make out one in particular saying something over and over again.

I was aware of my limbs now, aware of the alternating throb and stab of numerous grievous hurts. The world was slowly and painfully re-establishing itself around me. I hazarded opening my eyes—only one would respond—and found that Garrus' visage had taken up my entire field of vision. His mouth was moving, and I made the foolish choice to forget my wounds, forget the still major danger surrounding us, and tried instead to focus on understanding what he said.

"Shepard, stay—" was all I could understand before my translator, damaged by the blast, cut out. His words then were turian, strangely beautiful in their sibilance, lilting as they rose and fell with his voice; the flanged effect was more prominent in his native tongue than it was filtered through the translators. Through my one good eye I watched Garrus pull back, turning his head slightly to speak to someone—Miranda?—hovering on the very peripheral of my vision. Then he was leaning down again, his face right above mine, and I felt hands on me, probing, gently squeezing, inciting razor-edged tendrils of feeling to wend their way through my body. I tried to vocalize a protest to their ministrations and choked, the taste of blood suddenly thick in my mouth. I began to cough, and the involuntary spasms were agonizing as they pulled at the other, wounded parts of me.

"Try to relax, Shepard," Miranda's voice, next to my right ear as I struggled to make my reluctant lungs resume their duties. To someone else, she said, "We need to get her to the Normandy. _Now_."

Darkness was beginning to cloud the edges of my vision. I had ceased coughing, but it was still difficult to breathe. I heard the voices of Jacob and Miranda rise in urgent crescendo. I knew I was only instants away from blacking out completely and I welcomed that revelation—with that oblivion I would be mercifully unaware of the pain. Hands were shaking me, urging me to stay awake, but it wasn't a matter of mere willpower. Garrus, still looming over me, was trying to communicate in words I couldn't comprehend though his intention of keeping me awake, of reassuring me, was very clear. And then, as if realizing the reason for my confusion, he lowered his head until his mouth was next to my ear and spoke.

"Amory," he said, and without the aid of the translator the word was lengthened, almost intonated as he struggled to form the unfamiliar syllables. It was a word I hadn't heard spoken for years. It was my name. Even in my current, disoriented state, it was a bit of a shock; I had ceased to be Amory quite some time ago, instead assuming the mantle of Commander Shepard.

"Amory," he said again, more easily this time. He pulled back enough to be able to stare directly down into my face; I could almost feel him willing me to stay awake, so fierce the light of his gaze. But this was not a struggle I could win, and then finally, thankfully, the last threads of consciousness fell away.

**.x.**

I lived, of course. After having been crushed by atmospheric pressure and burnt to a crisp, a few bullet wounds and burns were easily enough repaired by Doctor Chakwas and the other medical minds of Cerberus. I lost two days to further reconstructive surgery and another five recuperating. By the seventh day I was so tired of the sterile white walls of the new Normandy's med-bay that I had determined that, short of restraints, nothing could keep me there another day longer.

Chakwas tried to persuade me I needed more time to heal, but in the end I proved I could be just as mulishly stubborn as the old Shepard, and throwing her hands up, she agreed to discharge me. I waved off her offers to help me strip off the standard bland white, tissue-thin medical gown and help me don my uniform. Being unable to dress myself was not an option and would lend credence to her argument that I wasn't yet fit for duty. I needed to be busy, to focus on the enormous task at hand; too easily had the dream and the terrible memories found me in the open tedium of doing nothing all day. The good doctor, usually even-tempered, bestowed me with a disapproving scowl before closing the shutters and leaving the med-bay to give me the privacy to dress.

It was not a pleasant affair. Every part of me still hurt in varying degrees; my limbs were all quite stiff despite the daily routine of simple exercises I'd been doing. From what I could see of myself without a mirror, my skin was now a canvas of scars; I imagined the whole picture was less than pretty. After attempting to squirm out of the gown, I finally ripped it and stepped out of the tattered remains. Donning my uniform was a study in pain and exasperation and I almost called Chakwas over the comm to ask for assistance. Finally, however, I gritted my teeth and forced my arms through the sleeves that fell far too constricting, poked my head through the collar, and with several muttered obscenities finally managed to pull the shirt down over my stomach. Breathing hard, body aching, I leaned back against the bed I'd previously been occupying and took a moment to rest and revel in the fact that I'd managed to successfully clothe myself.

There came a sharp knock at the door. "Yeah," I called, thinking it to be the doctor.

The door opened to reveal Garrus, instead. He stepped slowly into the room, head cocked to the side as he studied me silently. He looked different without the armor I was used to seeing him in; the form-fitting, dark synthetic weave of the Cerberus uniform made all the sharp, predatory angles of his turian anatomy more prominent. It made him look unfamiliar, and I was vaguely unsettled by that fact. Warily, I waited for him to speak.

"Your cybernetics are showing," he finally said.

I smiled and discovered that even that small movement caused pain to dart up and down my nerve endings. "Yeah, well, I looked much worse after they found me the first time."

"So I'd imagine."

He'd moved to lean against Chakwas' desk. The silence that followed was oddly strained. I knew he was angry; the tense lines of his body, the maintained flare of his crest and the set of his mandibled jaw made it obvious. And if I'd had any further doubts as to his current mood, there was a fierce and pointed light in his blue-grey eyes as he leveled upon me a hard and unrelenting gaze that served to confirm my suspicions.

The stubborn side of me wanted to remain quiet and see how long it would take for him to speak. The logical side of me decided that this situation would not be aided by my acting in an infantile manner. With an inward sigh I squared my shoulders, met his eyes, and broke the silence.

"I had to." No point beating around the bush; we both knew why he was here. I hated participating in conversations where the real issue was danced around, besides.

"_Had_ to?"

The heat in his voice made me wince. I lifted my left hand, gestured to the still-healing scars on my face. "I've survived worse."

_"You idiot."_ He pushed himself away from the desk and stalked over to me. Every step he took radiated a menacing fury and I found myself inadvertantly taking a step back to escape him. I checked the movement and instead held my ground until he stood mere inches from me.

"Shepard," he said, his voice thick with anger; the flanging was more prominent with the emotion coating his voice. For a moment he said nothing else, staring down at me from the vantage of his considerable height. My own stature being somewhat diminutive in comparison, I had to crane my head back in order to maintain eye contact.

Finally he sighed, an explosive exhale, "You shouldn't have taken the hit for me."

I found myself repeating what I'd said earlier, unable to think of anything else. "I had to."

He shook his head, backing off a little. "Explain to me why you think so."

The real reason, of course, was something I couldn't vocalize. I'd pushed him aside because I'd come back from something far worse—from _death_—but I'd also done it because I hadn't wanted to lose something I held so dear. As trite as it sounded, it was the truth. This new life I'd been given, this body that had been rebuilt, this consciousness that had been fished from the depths of oblivion—it was all mine, yes, but it wasn't _me_. To everyone else, I was the same Shepard that I had been two years ago. But I wasn't, in ways I couldn't in even begin to explain. I had been resurrected physically superior to what I had been before, and I was sound of mind, but something was missing, some vital component that left me feeling hollow and incomplete. I hadn't realized how much I'd needed something to link me to that old life, my old self, to keep me from feeling like I was still adrift. Garrus was that link.

"I knew I could take it," I said, and even to me it sounded lame.

He shook his head again, "No, you didn't. I saw your face, Shepard."

He was right. I hadn't know whether I could survive or not. I'd made the choice to keep Garrus alive simply because I couldn't let him die. "Maybe you're right," I said slowly, "but what difference does it make now?"

The sound he made was equal parts disgust and exasperation. The slender, tapered ends of his fringe flared slightly outward with the sound, alerting me as to just how great his discontent ran. He turned away, paced back to Chakwas' desk, and leaned back against it once more. There was an ardent glow to his turian eyes, a testament of his anger, and I found it exceedingly difficult to actually meet his gaze and hold it. Once more silence fell between us, reminding me of the purgatory I'd known in the minutes before my demise, but I couldn't think of anything to say that would ease this raw tension. Apologizing wouldn't help. Neither would venting the confusion I felt now. The stillness went on, wearing at my nerves; at war with the frayed edges of my psyche I was almost startled by the sound of his voice.

"I would have followed you to hell and back, Shepard."

"I know you would have, Garrus." It was hard to get the words past the lump in my throat. This entire conversation, as disjointed and anger-fueled as it had been, had thrown me so off-kilter that I hardly knew what I was feeling. There was my own anger, a righteous indignation that was, I knew, out of place in this argument. Resentment. Guilt. And underneath it all, a sinuous ribbon of something I couldn't and didn't want to name. I swallowed once, twice, and then asked a question that added a little undercurrent of panic to the mix as I wondered what his answer would be, "And now?"

"And now? Now you're different."

It was my turn to make a noise of dismissal, to try and disguise the fact that his response was alarming for more than one reason. My legs ached, my back hurt, my ribs were bruised, and the bones of my face were throbbing; I carefully lowered myself to sit on the edge of my former bed. Aware that Garrus was still watching me from across the room, I schooled my face into an impassive mask as to not reveal the level of my discomfort.

He waited until I was seated before he started speaking again; he hadn't expected a reply and I hadn't given one. "Something isn't right with you. You look the same. You talk the same. But you're not the Amory Shepard from before."

That shock again, from hearing my actual name. I remembered then when he'd whispered to me, when I'd been lying bleeding on the floor of an abandoned building in Omega, certain I was about to die yet again. I recalled the way it had sounded without the translator, falling from his mouth shaped by a tongue unfamiliar with the consonants and syllables.

"Did they do something you? Interfere somehow with your mind? Make you more malleable to their suggestions and motives? Remove some vital core of memories? I knew something had changed the moment I saw you in my scope. You even move differently than you used to. You seem almost—" Here he paused, shrugging and raising a hand as though searching for the right word. "You seem almost hesitant. If this is the _real_ you, Shepard, unchanged, then yes, I will follow you to hell and back. But how can I be certain? You're asking a great deal of your team this time around."

"I know I am," I said, bringing my hands to my face as though to rub the ache away. "I'm still me. I can't prove it to you. I remember everything that happened before. I remember our conversations, I remember our missions together, I remember—"

"Dying?"

His question snapped my head up, my hands falling away. He was watching me with that same piercing intensity; in the bright light of the med-bay, his eyes were suddenly a luminous threat. I opened my mouth to reply but found that I couldn't. Instead, I looked down to where my hands lay folded in my lap, and silently willed him to understand.

I heard him push away from the desk and head for the door. Anxious to stop him yet fearing to do so, I relented and gave him the answer. "Yes."

He halted, half-turned to face me. "Will you tell me?"

_No_, my mind said, but I wondered then, why not? It was no secret how I died. When I began to speak my words were oddly stilted as I forced them out of my mouth. I couldn't look at him, so my eyes began to trace linear paths from the floor to ceiling and then back again.

"I survived the explosion. I don't know how. But something—shrapnel, maybe—had sliced my air hose. I was suffocating. And the blast had thrown me into the planet's atmosphere. So I began to burn."

"Shepard." His voice was heavy with something akin to sympathy, or pity. I didn't want to know which because I didn't need either of those from him. I wasn't sure what I needed.

I wanted to tell him more. I wanted to tell him that I couldn't stand silence anymore, that even when I slept there was the soft hum of music in the background, that the enclosed space of any helmet now made my pulse race and skin go clammy. I wanted to tell him that I _was_ hesitant, because I knew now what awaited me after death, and it was nothing I wanted to experience again anytime soon. I wanted to tell him, conversely, that I'd taken those bullets meant for him because for some reason too convoluted and labyrinthine for me to unravel, I couldn't have stood there and watched him die.

Instead, I said, "It wasn't something a person gets through unscathed. But I assure you, Garrus, I _am_ the same as I used to be." I pushed myself off the bed, stifled the pained groan before it passed my lips, and nodded to emphasize that I deemed the discussion now over. I read in his expression that he wanted to pursue the issue, and so I met his look with the direct gaze of Commander Shepard, trying hard to broadcast an imperiousness I really did not feel. Apparently, it worked; he bobbed his head once in submission to my unspoken order.

"The same Shepard, save for a few cybernetic implants?" He asked, a teasing note in his voice as I walked past him towards the door. I was grateful for his willingness to change the subject tone, though I knew this discussion would continue at some other point in time.

I smiled and immediately wished I hadn't. "Just a few. Thanks for checking in on me, Garrus. I'll be going over some things with Kelly if anybody needs to speak with me."

Aware of his eyes on me, I managed to make my way out of the med-bay with only a slight limp, biting down hard on the sounds of pain.

**.x.**

_I'll no longer be haunting here, _

_I'm not coming back._

_The world must know my story ... _

_So long, Amory. _

_[The End Complete V: On the Brink – Coheed & Cambria]_

.


	2. Makeshift Prizefighter

_**A/N: **__Thanks to those of you that reviewed. I haven't written anything of substance for a very long time and subsequently the first chapter was a bit rough to hammer out, so I've gone back over it and made some edits. Hopefully you'll continue to enjoy the story. _

**.2.**

**-Makeshift Prizefighter-**

**.x. **

Surprisingly, I was in the days that followed able to secure three more recruits for the mission that most of them referred to as nigh-impossible. The salarian doctor, Mordin Solus, we picked up the day after my chat with Garrus in the med-bay. Mordin was not what I had expected from a doctor (or any doctor, for that matter), being somewhat cold-blooded and as equally given to ending lives as he was to saving them. That face aside, he seemed a valuable addition, bringing his vast stores of knowledge and considerable expertise to addressing the issue of finding a way to thwart the Collector's seeker swarms.

Jack was the next recruit. Our time aboard the prison-ship Purgatory was nothing short of a disaster. After the warden's decision to ensnare me rather than hand over Jack as arranged, things became unnecessarily complicated. Picking our way through escaped convicts and prison-guards—both of which were inclined to attack us on sight—we finally managed to corner and subdue the warden and then strike a very tenuous deal with Jack in exchange for her cooperation.

Grunt's recruitment was more or less as complicated as Jack's. His creator, the Warlord Okeer, was our original interest; Okeer's demise left us with a pure-blooded, tank-bred krogan youth—the very epitome of strength with a high penchant for violence. While both these were attributes that would indeed prove worthy throughout the course of our mission, Grunt's innate irritability and uncouth personality were things I often found myself wishing Okeer had bred out of him.

There was a short lull between Grunt's recruitment and our next directive; the amount of information needed to plot our next course of action was not something that would be ferreted out easily, even by the Illusive Man. And so the Normandy moved from planet to planet, systematically searching for elements and materials that could further benefit both team and ship. On the rare occasions a distress beacon or planetary anomaly was found, we would disembark via the shuttle to scout; these outings served somewhat to ease the inevitable cabin fever experienced by all those who had ever served aboard a military ship.

During the small window of down-time, I began to find ways to channel my ever-present, always-irritating uncertainties and worries into something productive. Some of the crew had transformed an unused corner of the cargo hold into a makeshift gym, complete with an old-fashioned punching bag, weight-lifting equipment, and mats for hand-to-hand training combat.

I started to invest serious time into polishing my melee skills. Miranda had insisted in the days after my premature awakening that I push the limit in terms of physical exertion in order to strengthen myself to get back into the shape I had been before my death. I'd done so, needing the knowledge that in a present fraught with so many uncertainties, I could rely on my own physical capabilities in those situations where all other methods of defense failed. With the aid of my new cybernetic implants, I was able to hit harder and move faster than ever before. This fact wasn't something I broadcasted, already feeling uncomfortable about my status as reborn hero come again to vanquish great evil.

One morning found me risen from my repose far earlier than usual; dogged by the memory of a suffocating lack of sound, I abandoned all hopes of more sleep and instead made my way to the cargo hold. Once there, I found myself presented with the rare occurrence of an empty gym. Usually in the earliest of hours there were a couple of crew members fresh off the graveyard shift, getting in their workout before they went off-duty. There was also the occasional ambitious soul willing to forsake a couple hours of sleep in order to fulfill their daily quota for physical activity. I took advantage of the opportunity. Whenever I was there and other people were about, I was always aware of their scrutiny, however surreptitiously they watched. Every person on board the Normandy was aware of how I'd died, and more to the point, how I'd been resurrected. I suppose it was only natural that they were curious, but it led to my being somewhat self-conscious over the course of my workouts.

I lost myself that particular morning in the pure physical outpouring of every concern, every worry, every irritation I'd dammed up inside over the past few weeks. I attempted to exorcise in ever lunge, kick and punch all of those hindrances. And for a while, breathing fast, covered in sweat and enjoying that tell-tale burn, it felt like I was succeeding.

After perhaps an hour of this, I grew aware of another presence nearby. I stopped my pummeling, reaching out to steady the bag with one hand while half-turning to see who had intruded on my makeshift haven. It was Jack. She was dressed in civilian wear—she adamantly refused the offer of a uniform—in a black sleeveless vest, loose dark pants belted with a chain and boots that looked even more monstrously militaristic than my own.

As I looked her way, she ran a hand over her shaved skull. "Hey," was all she offered.

I nodded, still breathless from my exertions. "Jack."

She turned and headed for the weight-lifting station, skirting the large blue worn-out mat meant for melee practice. Inwardly shrugging, I returned my attention to the punching bag. I'd entered a ready stance and was prepared to start up again when behind me, she spoke.

"Does it help?"

I turned fully to face her, wiping sweat from my brown with the back of one hand. I could have pretended not to understand what she was getting at, but I opted instead for candor. "A bit."

"I've always found it more … _therapeutic _if my target was living and breathing."

I immediately understood the offer, but decided to err on the side of caution. "I imagine they saw it differently after being on the receiving end of your biotics."

"No biotics," she said with a dismissive shake of her head. "No fancy shit. Just one-on-one." She paused, cracked her knuckles slowly, and smiled. "A brawl."

My decision was swift; a punching bag was great for practicing the offensive, but it would never hit back. Even the combat simulators I'd tried on the Citadel and the larger Alliance warships didn't provide the kind of all-inclusive stimulation of another living opponent. Of late, I'd been staring at my enemies down the barrel of one firearm or another without ever having to step outside that comfort zone. Jack had just presented me with the opportunity to ensure my self-defense skills were still intact.

"Alright." I said, and her smile grew wider.

We moved to the floor-mat, Jack taking one corner while I stood on the one diagonal to hers. I felt limber enough from the past hour of exercise to forego any warmups. Jack apparently saw no need for any either; she stood confidently before me, flexing her hands at her sides.

"Let's go, Shepard."

The words were scarcely out of her mouth before she began moving, gliding in a fast side-step to try and flank me. I spun on the spot to track her progress and was able to bring up both arms in time to ward of the quick punch she threw as she darted into my reach. As she leaped back I lunged, locked my arms about her waist, dropped to one knee and rolled her over my shoulder. She hit the mat hard but recovered more swiftly than I'd expected, dropping low into a defensive crouch. We faced each other for a long moment, our mingled breathing fast and loud.

I'd banked on Jack loving the offensive, and I wasn't disappointed. When she came for me next it was to unload a flurry of punches with both hands, some high, some low. She wasn't striking out with any particular finesse but what she lacked in form she more than made up for in sheer savage eagerness. I blocked the majority with my arms but she landed a glancing blow along the left side of my jaw. She threw another punch, directed at the same side of my face, but I'd caught her pattern now. I stepped into her charge, dropped a shoulder and threw myself full-force into the movement. I hit her square in the chest, her fist harmlessly cutting the air near my cheek as together we stumbled several feet. I felt her gather herself, planting her feet and shoving back; I let up a fraction, balled my left fist and aimed for her gut. It didn't land solidly because I'd telegraphed the movement, but as she recovered enough to shove me away I brought my right elbow up and drove it hard into her chin.

She choked, head snapping back and hands flying to her face. I pursued the advantage, sliding one of my legs around hers and locking it under the knee. I let myself fall, tripping her in the process; she stumbled and went down as I rolled out from underneath. I hopped up, twisted around and was surprised to see she'd already gained her feet. There was no smile on her face, her mouth twisted now in a feral snarl. She came at me this time in a frenzied rush, no planning behind her blows, only the iron determination to see me defeated. Jack was considerably shorter than I was and somewhat slight of frame, but the power housed within her form was comparable to that of a charging krogan—and this was without the prodigious power of her biotics.

Our sparring consumed my comprehension of time. Back and forth we went, neither of us really gaining ground, neither of us giving way. Several times she managed to land a shot by way of her wild burst of punches; while none of them were debilitating, I didn't doubt that my already impressive collection of bruises was growing. I tried to play to her obvious weakness, jack-knifing in to strike through her haphazard defense. Finally, I managed to succeed, sweeping her legs out from underneath her and throwing myself across her when she hit the mat face-first. Her arms pinned by the weight of my body, unable to dislodge me even through the furious bucking and squirming, she struggled another few seconds before finally falling still. I twisted my head around to see her face, and though her expression was murderous, she relented and nodded. Slowly, cautiously, I climbed off her and rose to my feet before offering her my hand.

Pushing herself to her hands and knees, she eyed my extended hand for a moment but chose to slowly stand on her own merit. And as she worked her jaw and rubbed at her chin, I suddenly realized that we were no longer alone. Behind Jack stood a clustered group of people, and recognizing several of them I inwardly groaned.

"Impressive work, Commander." This from Miranda, who stood at the forefront of the group; I knew she said it less because she actually thought my skills were impressive and more because she loathed Jack.

I lifted a hand, palm-out, to forestall any further comments that could and most likely would be incendiary. Jack had turned as well to face our audience, but to my relief had ignored Miranda's insult. I saw in the hands of some of the gathered crew personal data-pads and I guessed that a considerable sum of credits had just changed hands based on the outcome of our little match. I turned back to Jack, feeling the beginnings of several aches start up at various across my body, and meant it when I said, "Good fight."

"Not so bad yourself," she replied, regarding me with an expression I'd never seen her wear before; an instant later I realized it was respect. I began making my way off the mat, trying hard not to favor my right side where one of Jack's blows had caught me unawares. Miranda had turned and was already striding in her aggressive, confident way out of the cargo hold, but Jacob, Grunt, Garrus and Kelly had remained along with a few other members of the crew.

"Wasn't wrong about you, Shepard," Grunt said, eyeing me up and down as though to try and estimate how well I'd fare against his own considerable bulk in a one-on-one encounter. I had absolutely no desire to find out. He went on, "Thought maybe this'd be one of those slapping fights I read about that the females of your species sometimes get into."

"A cat fight." Jacob said, shaking his head. "That was no cat fight. Nice skills, Commander. Glad to see you haven't lost it."

"Jack almost cleaned my clock," I said, glancing over my shoulder to where the powerful biotic was now working with the weights. "I was lucky."

Jacob shrugged as though to indicate he wasn't sure whether I had or hadn't been fortunate; Grunt made the sound he was named for. Garrus, who had been completely silent during this exchange, spoke up.

"It wasn't luck. You watched her technique, you saw her weak spots, and then you went for the throat." The remainder of that sentence remained unsaid but I could hear it hanging in the air: _just like the old Shepard would've done._

"Maybe," I said, suddenly feeling self-conscious knowing Garrus had watched the entire fight. Since our tense encounter in the med-bay, I'd made a pointed effort to avoid the Normandy's only resident turian. It wasn't easy; with only four decks of limited space to wander, our paths crossed more often than not. I was uncomfortable with the fact that I'd revealed to him during that terse discussion just how rattled I was by the series of events that had shaped my life the last two years. It was, I knew, already difficult for him to trust me, as uncertain as he was about whether I'd returned the same Shepard that he once knew; knowing now that I was less than confident in myself and my reason for being, how far would he follow me? I hadn't spoken these insecurities aloud completely, but Garrus had always been dangerously perceptive and what I hadn't said would have been clear despite my silence.

"Come on, Shepard," Grunt rumbled, pushing past Garrus and stumping towards the mats. "Let's see how you do against a _real_ warrior."

As I opened my mouth to refuse, Garrus spoke instead, "You'll have to wait your turn, krogan. The next match is mine."

Startled, my eyes flew to his. His expression was openly inviting me to back down, and in doing so, prove that his suspicions about me were correct—what reason did I have for refusing him, if not to hide that I'd wasn't the same as I'd once been? I'd never sparred with Garrus before. I'd never had reason to. But it was clear to me in that moment that if I refused his challenge, it would give him a clear indicator that I'd been inexplicably and irrevocably changed by the process of my resurrection.

Aware that Jacob was beside me and watching our exchange with interest, and that Grunt had turned to observe from a few feet away, I finally nodded. "Alright, turian," I said, channeling the annoyance I felt at being backed into a corner this way into my voice. "You're on."

Garrus' mouth curved up in the turian equivalent of a sharp and fleeting smile, one without any real mirth. He brushed past me and headed for the mat, and reluctantly, dreading the imminent encounter, I followed. Grunt and Jacob, along with Kelly and the other remaining crew members, followed our little procession and stood a short distance from the mats themselves, ready to offer vocal encouragement to whichever of the two of us they would decided to cheer for.

This time, I took the corner Jack had taken, my back to the onlookers. Garrus took position where I'd been standing. The turian was still in uniform and as before, I speculated on the fact that he looked far more predatory without his armor than he did with it. I took a couple deep breaths, concentrating on the hurts I'd sustained in my match with Jack and wondering if I'd be able to stop Garrus from making them worse. I somehow doubted it. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Jack set down the barbell she'd been working with and turn to watch us both.

A hush had fallen over the cargo hold, broken only by the normal mechanical sounds of the ship's internal workings. I didn't like the quiet. Garrus had yet to make a move, but I knew enough about turian combat to know that one didn't charge like a fool in their direction and hope for the best. Jack had been a spirited fighter, but she was wild and unfocused. Garrus was clinical in his actions, detached and patient, and this made him all the more dangerous. I wouldn't be able to count on luck this time.

When he finally did move, it was so quick that I was caught off-guard. He surged straight for me, crest flared with aggression, needle-like teeth bared in a snarl. I danced backwards, whirled about and managed—barely—to avoid his outstretched hands by dropping to my knees and scuttling to the side. I was a heartbeat too slow on regaining my feet; a low kick caught me mid-section and it took all I had not to double over and collapse. As he attempted to deliver another kick I caught him by the ankle and twisted, hoping to offset his balance. Instead he lithely executed a complicated, flip-like maneuver that wrenched his ankle from my grasp while simultaneously letting him deliver a kick to my chin with the other limb.

I immediately tasted blood. He'd recovered his stance and was balanced on the balls of his feet. I, on the other hand, was busy blinking spots from my vision and rotating my jaw in an effort to alleviate the pain. It made sense that as a dutiful member of his race, Garrus would be a fighter of excellent skill; turians had the most formidable discipline of all the races known, and that discipline had gone a long way in making their military one of the most respected and feared. There would be no infuriating him to the point where he'd lose all self-control and rush at me blindly, as Jack had; Garrus would remain cool-headed until the end, and that did not bode well for me.

That disparaging realization aside, I was ready for him the next time he lunged. Grappling with him would be a bad idea—his reach far exceeded my own and the long, deceptive slenderness of his limbs didn't provide me with a lot of area to work with. I needed to keep him at bay and try to whittle down his impressive defense. However, such a task was easier said than done. After long minutes of attempting to maintain my guard against his potent, quicksilver, _painful_ strikes, I knew a change in tactics was needed. I let him in close, let him grip my arm and as he swiveled and fell to one knee to execute the throw I drove my elbow down as hard as I could into the middle of his back. The air whooshed from his lungs in a pained exhale and his grip loosened; I wrenched free, kicked at the back of his knee, and leaped as he toppled.

I hit him hard, my intent being to force him down face-first on the mat under my weight and catch his head in a choke-hold to force him to submit. But Garrus was fast, faster than I'd given him credit for. I'd tackled him full-body but he managed to flip around on me so that I was straddling his chest rather than his back. I squeezed hard with my thighs, hoping to cause enough pain to be a distraction. He was trying to dislodge me, grabbing at my upper arms in order to get enough purchase to throw me off. I reared back and hit him in the face once, twice, and almost connected a third time but he caught my fist with his hand. I tried to throw a punch with the other but he suddenly shoved upwards, smashing the bony ridges of his crest directly into my face.

The world went black for an instant, and I rolled off him in a haze of agony. I felt his fingers close about my neck and I knew it was nearly over. He began to squeeze with relentless determination. My vision cleared and I stared up into eyes that should have been cold and focused, but what I saw there was something else altogether; they glowed with an inner heat I'd never seen there before, something I could not identify. I clawed at his hold in vain while trying to hit something vital by blindly lashing out with my legs. My foot struck him mid-thigh and he grunted, his grip on my throat loosening. He was leaning across my upper body, bracing his elbows on my chest as he attempted to choke me into submission, but as the thrashing of my lower limbs increased, he brought his body over mine and straddled me as I had him such a short time before. He slid down until his knees were on either side of my thighs, effectively hampering my attempts to dislodge him. Again his grip tightened about my throat, but I wasn't quite done putting up a fight. I arched my back and bucked upwards while at the same time removing my hands from where they had wrapped around his wrists; curling my fingers into fists, I drove them both into his abdomen.

It worked. With a strangled hiss his hands fell away and he toppled back. I sprang into a crouch and threw myself at him, knowing that if I gave him the chance to recover I'd be right back on the losing side of this fight. I hit him full-force as he attempted to stand, my momentum taking us both down in a rolling tumble. He brought his arms up to shield his face so I began to aim lower, trying to land a punch that would again wind him and thus render him vulnerable. But Garrus was as stubborn as I was, and I began to wonder if perhaps this little match wouldn't be over until one of us really was dead.

I was tiring. The round I'd gone with Jack had been exertion enough, but Garrus was quicker and his defense nigh-impenetrable. The muscles in every part of my body were aflame, and I was beginning to feel weak. And so it was that I let slip my guard for that one notorious half-second that had made all great defeats in history possible; so intent on preventing him from landing that one final, knock-out blow was I that I failed to notice his other fist descending in a direct line to the side of my face. He hit me so hard that my mind went completely blank upon impact—all I was aware of for a span of a few heartbeats was a world of unrelenting white. When awareness drifted back to me I was again flat on my back with Garrus looming over me. I could see his fist, raised and balled for another shot and I knew that this time it would be the strike to end this little skirmish. His face was mere inches from mine and I found myself thinking, absurdly, that I'd never seen him look so fierce or so frightening. And suddenly I was angry, full of fury at him for a multitude of reasons, for making me prove my worth in such a way. My strength and endurance were flagging and I knew I'd lost, but I'd be damned before giving up this way. If he wanted to win, he was going to have to knock me out.

His fist trembled, and I knew he was a flashing second away from letting it fly. And so I summoned up the last dregs of energy I had and shot upwards, driving my head directly into his face. I was instantly aware of the blood, both mine and his, that ran in rivulets into my eyes and down my cheeks. I'd heard Garrus cry out in pain and I tried to get to my feet, but blinded by the blood and agony I couldn't see; I felt myself being shoved back to the ground and I blinked furiously to see Garrus crouched over me, trickles of dark blue running from his mouth and down his chin to drip onto his chest. In an action that seemed to take forever, he drew back his arm yet again and threw the punch.

And missed.

Except that he hadn't. As his fist struck the mat beside my head, as he stared down at me with wide, startled eyes, I realized he hadn't missed. He could have knocked me out cold with that blow if he'd wanted to. And as realization trickled into my mind, I felt my own eyes widen in response.

He hadn't missed. He'd hesitated. He'd made the conscious decision to check the punch before it had connected and rendered me senseless. Halted by some thought, some idea, some emotion, Garrus had hesitated.

It was the same error he'd faulted me for that day in the med-bay. It was the same trait within me that had caused him to question my authenticity as the real Commander Shepard. As all these thought fragments swirled within me in a struggle to be made whole, I became suddenly and alarmingly aware of his body pinning mine, of the sharp, powerful angles pressing down against me, holding me immobile. A flash of heat roared through me, disconcerting in its fervency, shaking me all the way to my core. I knew what it was—how could I not?—but I couldn't be feeling that here, lying on the floor covered in blood both red and blue, defeated in a battle that should never have happened. Perhaps Garrus had felt it too, that lightning bolt of white fire that had coursed through me, or perhaps he'd suddenly realized we still had an audience. Whatever the reason, he rose slowly to his feet, wiped at his bleeding mouth with a wince, and offered me his hand.

I became then aware of the people around us; judging from the good-natured cries of dismay, I was pretty sure that our draw had cost a few crew members even more credits. I ignored Garrus' proffered hand and climbed to my feet a little unsteadily. I wiped at the wetness on my face with my fingers—the two colors of blood that clung to my palm made me feel abruptly nauseous. I took a wobbly step forwards, then another, and found that my legs would function normally if I exerted a tremendous force of will. I didn't look back at Garrus. I didn't acknowledge the crew members who called out that I'd done well. I didn't reply to Jacob's words of praise, or Kelly's concerned battery of questions, nor did I return Grunt's painful slap on the back. I made my way out of the hold and to the lift with as much quiet dignity as I could muster, and once the doors had closed and sealed me in isolation, I sank back against the wall and closed my eyes.

I should have gone to the med-bay. Dr. Chakwas would be less than pleased by my new injuries and I knew a lecture was inevitable. But I couldn't make myself move for a long time. Instead, I stood there in the elevator and held my head in my hands, wondering what the hell I was going to do about my ill-fated, ill-timed attraction to Garrus Vakarian.

**.x.**

_I'll dig until we've made your grave_

_Oh, you've been a bad, bad boy._

_I'll cut until I carve it out_

_and stick it in a sad, sad song._

_Why the bother? You're no brother._

_You're the wrong I need._

_Boy, we all found an audience_

_while you found the worst of me. _

_[The Hound (of Blood and Rank) – Coheed & Cambria]_


	3. Head to the Horizon

**_A/N: _**_Some mature language in this chapter, consider yourselves warned._

**.3.**

**-Head for the Horizon-**

**.x.**

_I'll hide from subtleties while_

_I try to face my kind_

_[Umbra – Karnivool]_

_**.x.**_

"What the hell were you two thinking?"

Dr. Chakwas had the unique ability to reduce me to a state where I felt like a disobedient child for all the questionable decisions I had the habit of making. This was one such occasion. Seated on the end of one of the beds in the med-bay, aching in so many places that I was sure my entire body was just one uniform bruise, I felt like several kinds of hell. On top of that, the doctor's blatant disapproval was pummeling my already damaged ego. Averting my eyes from her stern glare, I answered her question through swollen, bloody lips.

"We weren't thinking."

"Damn right you weren't. Brawling like a couple of children! In front of the rest of the crew!"

"It was just a training match—"

"Like hell it was! It's already been uploaded to the Normandy's datanet, Commander. I saw the whole thing."

I sighed at that, though I wasn't really surprised. Footage of the commanding officer and one of her crew engaged in a battle royale would be in high demand from the rest of the ship. Reluctantly, I looked back at her and tried to shrug, wincing at the resulting twinges of pain. There was really nothing I could say in my defense. It had been overall a really bad call on my behalf.

She wasn't through berating me just yet. "In training matches, there's a certain protocol. There are boundaries. You and Garrus were trying to kill each other! Of all the people on this ship to vent your frustrations on, why Garrus? I thought you two were close."

"So did I," I muttered.

She folded her arms across her chest, huffing a sigh. When she spoke again, some of the anger had drained out of her voice. "Commander, why did you let it happen? You're the leader of this crew; everyone here looks to you for guidance. Has Garrus upset you somehow? Have you upset him? And even if that is the case, surely there must be a better way of dealing with it."

This was a discussion I really would have preferred not to have, but the doctor could be tenacious. "Garrus is … not entirely certain that I am the same Shepard I used to be. He thinks Cerberus may have changed some things when they rebuilt me."

"Like what?"

"Like my motives." I rotated my neck slowly, trying to ease the persistent, throbbing ache that was residing there. "He thinks maybe I've been remade as a Cerberus drone."

"He's a bloody idiot," she snapped. "And so are you."

"No argument there," I told her, sliding down off the bed. The moment my feet touched the floor, pain soared up my legs and into my ribs; if I hadn't known better, I would have said the good doctor smiled at my muffled whimper.

"Just a minute," she said as I began moving towards the exit. Obediently, I halted. "You'll heal," she said as she gave me one more thorough look over with her keen, probing eyes. She'd already doctored my facial gashes—who knew that getting hit with a turian's crest was roughly the equivalent of taking a battering ram to the face?—and the other scrapes and cuts I'd accumulated. Nothing was broken, although it sure felt like it. Apparently satisfied with her inspection, she stepped back and directed that stern gaze in my direction once more. "How badly did you hurt Garrus? Does he need my attention?"

I really wasn't feeling that charitable towards the turian at the moment, despite my earlier revelation. "I don't know. He's a big boy. I'm sure if he needs it he'll be here."

As I half-shuffled, half-limped to the door, she asked from behind me, "Do you want me to talk to him, Shepard? I'm sure he's just confused. Two years was a long time for you to be gone."

I shook my head as the door opened, not bothering to turn and instead speaking over my as I made my reply. "It's okay.. I'll deal with it. Thank you for the treatment."

"Don't thank me. You're still going to be very sore for a few days."

I'd already figured as much. Turning my head as much as I could considering how much it hurt, I gave her a stiff nod and an apologetic smile before making my way out of the med-bay.

**.x.**

For the next two days, I tried to remain low. As with my earlier attempts to avoid Garrus, this feat was easier said than done. The Normandy was not a large ship, and being the commander, I was required to spend a certain amount of time on the Combat Information Center deck, or the CIC. I tried to ignore the speculative glances cast my way whenever I made my appearance in different sections of the ship; the colorful spattering of bruises adorning my face and neck were, I was certain, the cause of much whispered discussion. Several crew members approached me to congratulate me on the fight I'd put up, one even going so far as to offer eager encouragement that once this whole Reaper ordeal was over, I look into joining the Galactic Interspecies Wrestling Association. I filed that particular suggestion away in order to reflect on it for more personal amusement at a later date.

Kelly, who had been present to witness the fight between me and Garrus, seemed on the verge several times of making an observation she wasn't sure I'd appreciate. I had an inkling as to just what it might entail, and was beyond grateful when she instead chose to keep our discussions limited to the status of the ship and crew. She wasn't the only one who had an opinion on what had happened between myself and Garrus, I was sure, but I really didn't care to know the gossip surrounding the issue. And so, maintaining a perpetual scowl that I'm sure looked worse in light of the wounds highlighting my face, I managed to dissuade people from pursuing that particular topic while in discussion with me.

Three days after the fight in the cargo-hold, my benefactor of questionable motives, the Illusive Man, notified me of a Collector assault on Horizon, one of the Terminus colony planets. I then found myself presented with an incredibly risky mission of great stakes. There was, to my dismay, a considerable amount of uncertainty that welled up within me as I pored over the details of the situation on Horizon in the hours while the Normandy was en route. This wasn't unusual; even before my death, during my time spent chasing Saren, I'd been prone to bouts of anxiety. However, I'd also been adept at compartmentalizing, shoving that anxiety aside so completely that I was able to channel all my focus into the task at hand.

I wasn't so sure that I could manage it that way anymore.

I hadn't seen Garrus since our fight. I found myself dreading the next encounter I had with him, which kind of threw a wrench into things as he was unquestionably my first choice to accompany me to try to protect the colonists of Horizon. For the last member of our group I chose Jack, a decision which thoroughly enraged Miranda—something she made me aware of almost immediately.

"She's a mistake waiting to happen, Commander." Miranda told me heatedly, standing with both hands on her hips near the windowed wall of her quarters. I remained by the door, uncomfortably warm, outfitted as I was in the heavy ERCS gear that was my standard for missions such as these. Miranda had urgently requested my presence in her office as I'd been making my way to the shuttle; I realized in that moment that I should have just ignored her and left.

"You're basing this assumption off what evidence, exactly?" This from Garrus, standing at my side. He'd been at the elevator when I'd neared and had heard her summons come over the comm; although Miranda had pointedly asked to speak to me alone, Garrus had wordlessly followed me here. I knew he wasn't the biggest fan of Miranda—truth be told, it was difficult to find someone who was—and I suspected he'd persisted on being present just to irritate her.

"I'm basing it off the fact that she's a violent and unpredictable sociopath," Miranda snapped; the look she slanted at Garrus was almost sharp enough to bleed by.

"It was your boss that suggested she was ideal for recruitment," I reminded her, shifting my weight from one leg to another as a large bead of perspiration ran from the nape of my neck down my spine.

"Even the Illusive Man can be mistaken—"

"No." I interrupted her, holding up one hand. Miranda was, aside from the few krogan I'd been associated with, one of the most difficult individuals to deal with that I had ever encountered. Her inherent air of superiority was quickly wearing me thin. It rankled her that I was in command of the vessel and our mission against the Collectors; I knew instinctively that what bothered her the most was the fact that she'd led the Lazarus Project and that, upon the project's completion, had had to step aside and serve under the very subject she'd labored over so intensely for two years: me.

"I don't agree with a lot of the shit the Illusive Man has thrown our way, but Jack is a powerful and proven asset to this team."

"She's a _psychopath_, Shepard. A freak of nature."

"And it was Cerberus that made her that way," I countered. I was beginning to sweat in earnest now and my annoyance levels were rising in direct correlation to my body temperature. I had a suspicion that my armor's thermal regulator was on the fritz and I made a mental note to ask Jacob to take a look when we returned. _If_ we returned. "I don't have time to indulge in the alpha-female pissing contest between the two of you, Miranda. Jack's coming with me."

The taller woman's jaw was set as she stared at me with eyes colder than the icy surface of Alchera. I could almost hear the grinding of her teeth. "Very well, Commander." She finally said, the words clipped and toneless. And without another word, she turned her back to us and strode to her desk, effectively ending the conversation. I deliberated further reprimand, but instead turned and gestured for Garrus to follow me out.

As we made our way to the lift, I was so distracted by my irritation over Miranda's attitude and the fact that the interior of my armor had become a sauna that I was startled when Garrus broke the silence.

"Shepard, I owe you an apology."

We had reached the elevator. I remained quiet until we'd stepped inside, waiting for the doors to close as I mentally waded through appropriate things to say. I finally settled with "None necessary."

"EDI, halt the lift, please." He said.

The ship's AI replied in her measured monotone, "Done, Officer Vakarian." I frowned. In correlation with my recent discovery of the attraction I was harboring that I was certain would do me no good, the fact that I was now confined in close quarters with Garrus made my heart do something funny in my chest. I heaved an inward sigh. This was just what I needed.

"I'll make it quick," he said as I opened my mouth to question. A moment passed as we watched each other, my eyes both wary and inquisitive, his completely unreadable. The marks of our fight were still present upon his face; the grey skin darker in some places to mark the bruises he'd received courtesy of me. Several cuts and scrapes, most notably around his mouth where I'd rammed my forehead, were still in the process of healing as well. I almost felt guilty. Almost.

"Two years was a long time to sit and wonder about you, Shepard."

Confused now, and made even more so by a tiny, unfurling bloom of an emotion within me that I didn't want or need to be feeling, I said for lack of having anything else, "I'm sorry."

But he shook his head. "Just listen. For two years I thought you were dead. I mourned you more than any other friend I've ever had and lost. And I've never had many of those." He had turned to face the doors of the lift, but he cast me a swift, sideways glance as he paused. "It's rare that turians encounter someone of another species that we consider equals. Hell, with humans it's even rarer. No offense."

"None taken," I said, wondering where the hell this was going.

"That's what you were, Shepard. My equal. Someone who fought for all the things I believed in and succeeded. Next to you, other members of C-Sec and even other turians were diminished in my eyes. It was a … revelation, of sorts."

"Garrus, I—"

"And then there you were on Omega, living and breathing, and I felt … I don't know, something I'd been missing since I heard the news that you'd died. Too good to be true, I thought. So I watched you, and you were different, and I thought maybe I'd been right. It _was_ too good to be true. Cerberus isn't the most forthright in their dealings, and we've been screwed by them before back in the old days. I didn't know if I could trust you. I didn't know if you were the real thing."

I was getting tired of repeating myself. "Nothing has changed. I told you, I'm the same as I was before."

"But I'm not, Shepard."

His words hung in the air between us, almost tangible in their significance. He'd turned to face me again and I found myself unable to tear my eyes from his, so openly and uncharacteristically earnest they were in that moment. And though I was sure I knew, though I was afraid to know more, I asked, "What do you mean?"

He made a noise that seemed both self-deprecating and frustrated. "I was so fucking angry when you died. We all were. And then you show up again, the same but different, and instead of being happy I found myself getting angrier still. I didn't understand how you could be back. I'd made peace with it. And I'll admit it, the fact that it was Cerberus that found you and brought you back made me even more furious. If I'd known where you were, Shepard … if I'd known there was a chance ..."

I must have moved in the seconds of silence that followed, for his gaze, which had been unfocused somewhere over my right shoulder, snapped back to my face. "Do you remember, back on the old Normandy, when Wrex challenged you to a fight? You took him on without hesitation and you kicked his ass. You showed no mercy, no signs of backing down, only that same drive to survive and to win. I needed to know you were still that person." He lifted a hand and gestured to the bruises decorating his face. "I'll be honest, I didn't think you'd go for it."

"So what now, Garrus? Have I satisfied your curiosity yet? Can you accept that Cerberus hasn't fucked with my brain somehow?" My voice was strident, riddled as it was with those pesky emotions that I was having such a hard time controlling of late. Rather than feeling mollified by his admissions, I found myself instead more bewildered and angry than anything else. He wasn't the only one having doubts, being conflicted at every turn by a world that had changed without my wanting it to.

There was a lengthy, weighty silence. "I don't know," he said quietly, and then more loudly, "EDI, resume."

As the lift finished its descent to the fourth deck, the only sounds around us were that of the ship. When the lift slowed and shuddered to a halt and the doors opened, I turned to him and spoke quickly in a low, terse voice.

"You think you were confused, Garrus? I came back from death to nobody I knew. I learned that I'd died and that I'd been rebuilt, like some kind of fucking machine. And then I found out Cerberus was behind it all, and that the mess I'd left behind—the Reapers, the geth, the political bullshit—was still there waiting for me. When I found you on Omega, it was the first time since I woke up that I felt something close to normal. You say you're done doubting how authentic I am, but we both know that's not true. And I can't trust you because of that. So don't do me any favors, trying to explain away your reactions. When you're ready to truly accept that I'm the same as I was, we can talk."

I heard the sound of the shuttle firing up behind me in the large, cavernous recesses of the cargo hold. That reminder of what just what awaited me added more fuel to my emotional fire, and so I flashed Garrus a wide, insincere and fierce smile before backing out of the lift and giving him a mock salute. "Just so we know where we stand," I said, before turning to jog to where Jack and the shuttle waited.

**.x.**

Stepping out of the shuttle and onto Horizon's grassy earth, my gaze was drawn immediately to the enormous vessel rising from the ground to penetrate the ominous swirl of clouds gathered overhead. When viewing the Collector's ship from space, it seemed monolithic; this close, in this setting, it was positively gargantuan. Its presence magnified and intensified the scope of our current mission.

As with most garden planets, the air on Horizon was safe to breathe and I had been able to forgo a full helmet, for which I was thankful. As behind me Jack and Garrus disembarked, I inhaled deeply, taking a moment to enjoy the faintly scented freshness of the air. There was a disturbing stillness about the colony, as though we were already too late to prevent the disappearance of the colonists. With that sobering thought, I exchanged grim glances with Jack and Garrus, earlier issues shoved aside for the sake of the task at hand.

We set out in a staggered formation, myself in the lead, Jack behind me, and Garrus at the rear. With the Locust cradled in a two-handed grip, I led us quickly and cautiously into the heart of the colony proper. There was an eerie lack of any signs of activity the further we progressed; Garrus remarked softly over the comm that it looked like they'd simply vanished into thin air. There was still terraforming machinery left out in the open—some of it still running—as if the operator had simply dematerialized while using it. Within some of the empty buildings there were tables with plates of still-warm, half-eaten food. Valuable personal items were still on display or in their containers. It seemed as though the citizens of Horizon had simply ceased to exist.

The further we went, the thicker the seeker swarms became. The insect-like drones came and went around us, apparently scouting for further victims, but Mordin's prototype shielding was working like a charm and we were effectively invisible to them.

After about twenty minutes of searching through empty buildings and open expanses, we entered a large, twisting passage built into the earth. The retaining walls were taller than myself and I couldn't see over them; with a hand gesture I sent Garrus and Jack to take positions flanking me. Slowly and carefully, keeping the wall at my shoulder, I eased around the corner to see what awaited us. What I saw was my least favorite thing in the universe aside from dreams of silence …

Husks.

**.x.**


	4. Evolve Monster

**_Edit: _**_I'd left out a major chunk of this chapter the first time, hence the repost._

_**A/N: **__I really appreciate and take to heart all that has been said in your reviews. I hope I can continue to keep the story interesting in the chapters to come. Thanks again for your support! _

**.4.**

**-Evolve Monster-**

**.x.**

_Good eye, sniper._

_I'll shoot, you run._

_[A Favor House Atlantic – Coheed & Cambria]_

**.x.**

There were four of them milling about in a group, their walk shambling and aimless. I noticed right away that these were different than the ones I'd encountered on Eden Prime—they seemed more eerily advanced, more artificial construct than broken revenant as the others had appeared. It was difficult to remember, staring at their forms that were so very human, that they were just shells, reprogrammed and redesigned to do the bidding of the Reapers. An unavoidable comparison slipped through my mind, and I wondered for a moment, was I really any different? I'd died, been rebuilt, given a new directive—

One of the husks swiveled in my direction, head lolling to the side. Even though its eerie eyes were unblinking and vacant, I knew I'd just been spotted. As though in echo of that realization, a low and breathy moan filled the air, emanating from the mouth of the husk before me; the ghastly sound was picked up by its brethren as, one by one, they turned in my direction.

"Shepard?" Garrus' voice came over the comm as the horrible moaning reached a crescendo.

"Husks!" I shouted. I knew better than to stand there and try to gun them down; even if I managed to put an end to one the rest would swarm me. So I emptied my clip, aiming for the middle of the group in an attempt to make them scatter, before whirling about and racing back up the gentle incline. I darted around the stack of crates Jack was using as cover and ejected my heatsink, sliding in another while quickly speaking over the comm.

"Garrus?"

"I'm on it."

A shot rang out, followed by a wheezing screech. Garrus was in position across a small clearing from us, kneeling on a stack of crates with the scope of his sniper rifle aligned to his eye. As he fired another round, I gestured to Jack to follow me and stepped out from behind cover.

There were even more husks now than the original group I had seen; the eerie sounds they'd made had effectively served as an alarm bell, summoning more of their number that had been in range. Two were down; as I watched, Garrus' third shot exploded the head of another. Jack and I fanned out, holding our position, and on my mark began to open fire.

The Locust I was wielding lacked the power of Jack's shotgun, but I was still able to do an impressive amount of damage with each burst. The husks mindlessly kept pouring into our line of fire, and I was thankful they lacked the scheming intelligence I'd encountered amongst the numerous other enemies I'd accumulated over the years. With Garrus smoothly and unerringly picking off the husks furthest from our position and the combined firepower of Jack and myself, we managed to thin their ranks quite nicely.

Immediately upon my internal sigh of relief at that fact, Garrus let out a sound of warning; from his elevated vantage point, he was able to see farther into the colony than we were. And from around the corner of a building poured forth another swarm of husks, a quickly moving mob of milling limbs and low, haunting cries. There were far too many for us to hold the position; we needed to fall back and regroup. But as I uttered the command to retreat, Jack shook her head, dropped her shotgun, and ran forward to meet the oncoming husks.

"JACK!" I bellowed, my words blending with Garrus' alarmed shout of "_What are you doing?_"

I raced towards her, fumbling behind my back to swap my Locust for the grenade launcher. As I skidded to a halt by her side and realized the husks were now too close for me to open fire on with incendiary rounds—I'd blow the husks _and_ my team to hell if I tried—Jack rushed forward in a charge, the war-cry that poured from her throat more savage in nature than those I'd heard from enraged krogans. With an underhanded swing of her right arm, an explosion of biotic power erupted forth in a massive shockwave, obliterating the husks directly in its path and violently tossing the ones caught on its edges into the sky to smash against the surrounding buildings or stacks of crates. And in its wake, the biotic attack left behind nothing but devastation.

There was a moment of silence in the aftermath. Jack remained still, clenching and unclenching her fists, before turning around and walking calmly back to where I stood, leaning down, and grabbing her discarded shotgun. She then looked at me with an expression of open defiance, waiting, I knew, to be berated for disobeying a direct order.

Instead, I stepped forward, clapped her on the shoulder, and said earnestly, "Nice work."

A smile flickered about her lips and disappeared. Garrus, hopping down from his makeshift sniper's nest, also voiced his admiration. "Very impressive. I thought we were going to have to retreat all the way back to the shuttle."

"Me too," I admitted. The three of us looked over the carnage littering the ground before us; Jack's biotics had literally torn most the husks apart. Shredded limbs and green ichor stained the grass, marking a grisly path for us to walk. My eyes rose from the viscera to find again the Collector vessel rising like some vengeful deity against the skyline. Thus far, there had been no sign of Horizon's colonists anywhere, but the fact that the Collectors hadn't yet departed the planet gave me a small sliver of hope that maybe we'd be able to find and save some of them.

As Jack and Garrus took a moment to check their weapons and swap their heatsinks, I let my gaze wander over the terrain. The colony had been built among a series of gently rolling hills and slight valleys. Clumps of small trees were present in sporadic design, young saplings no doubt transplanted shortly after colonization. They mingled intermittently with taller, thicker trees with leaves of soft blue and shimmery lavender undersides, their wide trunks covered in pitted white bark. These trees were obviously ancient and native to Horizon and it was clear the colonists had valued them, for none of the blue-leaved trees had been felled in the construction of the settlement.

In spite of the urgent and severe reason for our being on Horizon, I couldn't help but appreciate its arcadian scenery. As though in echo of my strayed observation, Jack remarked, "This could almost be a nice place."

"Let's go," I said, not wanting to dwell, readying the Locust once again. I took the lead, stepping slowly over the corpses and watching carefully to ensure that they were all dead—past experience made me aware that sometimes husks could survive the most severe of wounds and rise again. Thankfully, Jack's attack had been thoroughly deadly, and no hands or gaping mouths attempted to latch onto me as I moved past. My boots squelched in the blood and gore with each step I took; the smell rising from the corpses was one of the most awful I'd ever had the misfortune to come across, and I felt my lip curl in revulsion as my stomach gave a rebellious heave.

Behind me, trying to follow the exact path I was taking, Jack made a soft gagging noise. And from behind her, Garrus spoke with open and plaintive disgust, "These are new boots. There's blood and brains on my new boots. And this _smell_ … turians have a stronger olfactory sense than humans. This is worse than a herd of dirty krogans after mating season. Why don't we ever go anywhere nice, Shepard?"

I smiled. Even though it seemed ludicrous to enjoy his lighthearted demeanor immediately following the encounter we'd just had, I couldn't help it. This was the Garrus of old, able to transition from razor-sharp battle awareness to easy humor and back again with an ease I envied. His jocular camaraderie helped to alleviate the tension that ran high during missions such as these and I had always been grateful for his ability to make light of even the most dire of situations. And so, as I carefully squished my way across more dismembered husks, I asked aloud, "What kind of place did you have in mind, Garrus?"

"Hmm … I hear Haestrom is nice this time of year. The solar radiation is exceptionally spectacular. Or there's always Omega … it's renowned for its high-class dance institutes, you know."

Jack snorted, "By high-class, you mean the kind of place where you slide credit chips into asari g-strings after the show, right?"

"Only if you _really_ liked it."

"Omega's a shithole," Jack replied. I silently agreed with her; if I had my choice of places to visit for a break from missions that had me slogging through smelly innards, it sure as hell wouldn't be Omega.

"A _classy_ shithole," Garrus corrected.

"Whatever," Jack said dismissively, but I heard the faint undercurrent of amusement in her voice.

We'd managed to clear the small field of husk bodies and stood again on clean, silver-green grass. Before us rose a maze-like array of buildings and shelters the colonists had erected. Line-of-sight for targeting would be less than ideal as we combed the large area for signs of survivors, and I really didn't like the thought of encountering more husks in the closed confines of the buildings. Not that I had a choice; lives depended on us this time around.

"Split up or stay together?" Garrus asked.

"Together," I gestured at the small settlement with the barrel of my gun. "Let's do this."

**.x.**

We started finding colonists as we perused the abandoned buildings and sheds. They were alive, more or less, caught in some kind of paralytic stasis, trapped in various positions of mobility as though the malady came upon them unawares. Which it most likely did, as the seeker swarms moved fast and quiet. A great uneasiness unfurled inside me and began to grow as we passed immobile colonists cowering on their knees with their hands lifted in supplication or with their mouths frozen wide in screams of terror. There was still a heavy silence blanketing the colony, and though we had shattered it during our encounter with the husks it had returned, threatening in its entirety. It served to unsettle me even further, reminding too much of the soundless void of space.

We began finding strange, pod-like devices, and we quickly discerned that these belonged to the Collectors, a method of transporting the paralyzed colonists away to meet some kind of unpleasant demise. For an indeterminate amount of time we searched on, going through every building, searching every accessible stretch of yard, all the while the three of us becoming increasingly aware that sooner or later, we would meet our foe in this still and eerie fledgling colony.

When finally we did cross paths with the Collectors, despite our heightened wariness, they caught us unawares. They descended on us from above as we moved in a line through an open courtyard-like area, their presence announced with a buzzing that sounded very much like the high-speed flutter of an insect's wings. The comparison was not far off; the Collectors were insect-like in appearance, walking upright but possessing thin, contorted limbs and strangely shaped heads with multiple glowing, amber eyes. Their weapons were unexpected, energy-based like that of the geth rather than ammunition based like our own. They were also capable of erecting scintillating golden barriers that deflected most our fire; a few well-placed concussive blasts from Garrus quickly rectified that particular issue.

From the first shot fired, their combat behavior was exceedingly erratic. I had become separated from Garrus and Jack as we'd initially run for cover. The two of them had been forced behind the diminutive shelter of a low retaining wall and they were more easily visible than I was crouched behind a pyramid of heavy metallic shipping containers. The Collectors, however, kept directing their attacks my way, almost ignoring my two companions entirely. Finally, unable to kill them fast enough to keep them from converging on my position, I was forced to back away from my cover as they neared and frantically look around for another viable place to safely take shelter. My options were slim; spying a large and gnarled tree rising in the middle of the yard some fifty feet from where Jack and Garrus were positioned, I sucked in a deep breath and burst from cover.

I'd almost reached the tree when a Collector descending from the sky dropped to the ground in front of me, causing me to swerve off-course. It reached for me with one segmented limb and I twisted aside, stumbling and hitting the ground hard on my knees. I got off a shot as I lurched back to my feet, but it went wide, a result of my haphazard aim. The Collector was closing in as I loped sideways, still trying to make my way to the tree. The creature's head exploded suddenly in a shower of gore, and as the body toppled sideways, I whispered my fervent appreciation into the comm, "Thanks."

"I shoot, you run." Garrus responded, and another Collector that had been racing towards me dropped dead as a bullet penetrated its brain. I began to run again, veering sharply towards the ancient tree and what little cover it could offer me. I slid in behind it as enemy fire began to dog my heels.

In a crouch behind the whorled trunk of the tree, I ejected another heatsink from my Locust and reloaded. It was then that Jack made a disturbing observation, her voice coming in clear over the comm despite the sporadic bursts of enemy fire and the thunderous, near-deafening boom of Garrus' rifle.

"They're trying to herd you, Shepard. Cut you off and get you alone."

I sneaked a cautious look around the tree. Sure enough, four more Collectors were beginning to converge on my location, completely ignoring Jack and Garrus. One dropped from another shot from Garrus as I watched. I ducked back behind the tree as the remaining three creatures opened fire on my position.

"She's right," Garrus said in the pause between taking one shot and another. He added grimly, "That can't be good."

Against my back, the trunk of the tree shuddered from the impact of an energy burst. I tucked my head into my neck and lifted both arms protectively as jagged splinters of wood rained down around me. Unnecessarily, Jack said, "Unless that tree is armor-plated, you're going to have to move."

That wasn't really an option; I couldn't run to Garrus and Jack and the closest building was at least fifty feet from the tree and to get there I'd be moving through a completely open space. Another shot struck the tree and I heard a sharp, ominous crack. A sudden thought took hold, and pressing my lips into a thin, resolute line, I holstered the Locust and grasped the grenade launcher.

"There's going to be heat," I warned. "I'll move right after. I'll need cover fire."

"Do it, Shepard."

I rose to my feet, cradling the launcher; completely extended, it was a cumbersome weapon and not at all ideal for moving quickly as the current situation required. I took a deep, steadying breath. The Collectors were close and there was a chance that the blast would hit me as well, but it was a risk I had to take. I tightened my hands on the weapon and slid out from behind the tree, aiming high as I pulled the trigger.

Three grenades sailed into the nearest clustered group of Collectors in quick succession, their impact immediate and blistering. I felt the resultant wave of heat lick at my backside as I whirled about to begin my mad dash to the closest of buildings. The grenade explosions had been loud enough that a persistent, numbing ring had invaded my ears, but I could make out the tinny and distorted sounds of Garrus and Jack firing in order to cover my retreat.

I'd just reached the stairs leading to the dark, open doorway of a colonist dwelling when a stray shot from a Collector weapon struck me low in the back. Even with the formidable protection offered by my armor and the additional shielding I'd had integrated into the suit, it hurt. I went down in a graceless sprawl; unable to soften my fall, I hit face first, the solid ground unforgiving beneath my cheek. The faint, exotic perfume of the silvery-green grass permeated my nostrils as I attempted to use my arms to push myself up but a sudden and excruciating spasm shot up my spine, and I collapsed once more. I heard rapid footsteps approaching; I managed to roll myself over with a dazed groan and I saw Jack and Garrus running hell-bent in my direction.

"Were you hit?" Garrus demanded as he dropped to one knee beside me. I nodded, still breathless from the impact, unable to speak for the choking knot of pain lodged in my throat. "Jack!" he snapped as he pulled me into a sitting position.

The biotic wordlessly swung about and began to lay down suppressing fire, forcing the Collectors to take cover or be shredded by the spray. With one arm around my shoulders supporting me, Garrus performed a quick survey of my form in order to ascertain how severe my injury was. As the pain subsided into throbbing pangs, I pushed his arm aside and managed to say, "I'll be okay. We need to move."

As I got slowly to my feet, re-orienting myself against the momentary spinning of the world around me, Garrus stepped in beside Jack and added the steady fire of his assault rifle to her attack. The grenade launcher had escaped my grasp upon my being hit and had landed some several feet away in the veritable no man's land, and so I fell back on my most trusted and favored firearm. Ducking low behind the solid metal railing to avoid attracting more enemy fire, I edged my way up the stairs. Once I'd reached the top, I called for Garrus and Jack to follow; as they swiftly obeyed, I provided a steady rain of cover fire with the Locust.

There were only two Collectors remaining. Between my grenade attack, Garrus' adeptness at sniping and Jack's highly efficient amalgam of weaponry and biotic power, we'd managed to subdue the group. Kneeling beside me, bracing the sleek metal barrel of his Incisor rifle on the metal railing, Garrus brought the scope to his eye in a movement so practiced and seamless it seemed to be to him like the simple, mindless task of breathing. I concentrated my fire on the closest of the creatures, unloading a clip into its midsection and experiencing a warm wave of satisfaction as it went down. The last of the Collectors fell victim to Garrus' inerrant aim.

Once again an almost oppressive hush fell over the colony, as though the lengthy firefight between our factions had never happened. The three of us exchanged solemn glances; our first encounter with the Collectors had not gone easily at all, and in them we now had a new and redoubtable enemy. It was a sobering realization.

I headed back down the stairs, walking back out into the corpse-strewn clearing to further examine the bodies of the Collectors. Garrus remained near the door of the building, eye glued to the scope and finger hovering at the trigger in preparation to take care of any unwanted company. Jack and I studied the strange, fallen forms as intently as we could with our need for haste, running our omni-tools over them in order to capture whatever data we could to upload later into the Normandy's databanks. Once finished, we returned to Garrus' position. No words had passed between us the entire time; the three of us were, I know, reflecting on the how grave the stakes had become with the appearance of the Collectors.

More glances were exchanged between us then but we chose not to break the silence. Instead, with a tilt of my head, I indicated the direction we'd take, weaving through buildings in order to try to avoid drawing attention from the enemies we knew now to be airborne. And so we continued our search, this time our minds as one unquiet as we moved into more territory that held only the unknown.

**.x.**

We found one survivor, a colonist, sealed away in an underground garage. It had been a suitable bolt-hole—he'd both lived and managed to avoid being subdued by the seeker swarms. He was less than grateful to see us, having expected a full Alliance squadron to come rushing to the rescue. What we did learn from him, via Garrus shifting fluidly into threatening turian mode, was that the colony had in fact one major and significant defense mechanism: an enormous energy cannon. Of course, re-activating it would require herculean effort on our behalf; the control panel for the weapon lay a fair distance from the subterranean shelter, in the midst of the colony most occupied by the Collectors.

We left the man inside the shelter; he'd refused to come along and assist us. A part of me uncharitably hoped he would run afoul of the creatures outside the walls. And so with shared trepidation and wariness, the three of us had battled our way to the heart of the colony, where the defense tower stood immobile and inactive. Having learned from our first encounter with the Collectors, we were able to predict with some success their actions in the heat of the battle. Disturbingly, more often than not, they did as they had done before and tried to partition our group, attempting to drive me away from Garrus and Jack. We managed to circumvent their strategy and eventually overcome all groups we came up against.

Re-activating the tower was a process of nightmarish difficulty, as it involved both creating a link to EDI and maintaining that link by way of preventing any Collector interference. They came for us in waves, husks accompanying them, but we'd managed to pinpoint the most strategic of positions and by using them, were able to systematically eliminate them one by one. New variations of husks appeared at one point, lumbering abominations that seemed to be the grotesque fusion of several husks together. They attacked with a biotic shockwave much like Jack's; we learned that by keeping them at a distance, they were easily defeated by a couple of precise shots from Garrus' rifle.

When the cannon was finally reactivated by merit of EDI's interference, it began firing immediately upon the monstrous Collector vessel, the light from its offensive beams nearly blinding the three of us. It scored three direct hits before the ship began to power up and begin to launch, the process of which caused the earth to quake beneath our feet. As we struggled to maintain our footing, we were helpless to do anything but watch as the ship departed, the cannon still firing even as the target rapidly left its firing range.

When the ship was no longer visible and the cannon had powered down, we were left again in an eerie and desolate silence. In the face of our monumental failure, all we could do was try to hope against hope that someone was left behind and remained alive, and so we began heading further into the colony to search. We were belayed in our task, however, by the appearance of an armored man striding out from a small, armored building that looked to be the colony's main center of operations.

He wore a breather helmet and his face was hidden. Even from a distance, there was something familiar about his shape, about the strong and purposeful strides he took as he approached us. And as he drew neared, the realization struck me like a hard fist to the gut.

"Kaidan," I uttered voicelessly as he came to a halt before us.

He didn't reply until he'd removed his helmet. Once it was cradled beneath his arm, his gaze moved from Jack to Garrus and finally settled on me. I'm not sure what I had been expecting, but as we came face to face, I was completely unprepared for his expression of disbelief mingled heavily with reproach.

"Kaidan," I said again, a greeting of sorts. Another remnant from a past I'd so unwillingly left behind, he'd been in the time before my end a close friend, a trusted advisor, a confidante …

A lover.

"Commander Shepard." He said formally after a moment of thick silence.

He looked good, the same as he had when we'd parted that ill-fated day two years ago—tall, dark hair cut short, chiseled jaw clean-shaven. So familiar, those wide brown gold-flecked eyes, though I was more accustomed to finding warmth in their depths instead of the detached coolness I was seeing now. I was at a loss for words. I knew him more than well enough to know by his stance, the set of his face, the lack of light in his eyes that he was angered. He saved me the trouble of struggling to string reluctant words together into something intelligible by speaking first.

"I'd heard the rumors you were still alive and working with Cerberus. Sorry to see the latter is true."

I could have denied it, but there was no point. Though the armor of myself and Garrus and Jack was completely devoid of any mark identifying us as lackeys of Cerberus, the bold tell-tale symbol was emblazoned upon the barrel of my Locust and Jack's shotgun. And so, with the sinking feeling that I knew how this conversation would end, I replied, "Both true."

He shook his head, a V of consternation appearing between his dark brows. "Cerberus, Shepard? Have you forgotten what we found on them back then?"

"Of course not. I don't like it either, but I had no choice." Empty words, I knew.

"What about the Alliance? What about those of us you left behind?"

I understood the underlying question, of course. How could I not? "The Alliance," I said carefully, "sent me to deal with geth when the threat of the Reapers was still very real. The first Normandy was destroyed as a result—you were there, Kaidan. You saw it happen." He opened his mouth to interrupt, but I held up a hand so that he would let me finish. When I continued, my voice was soft and laden with all the regrets and sorrows I'd had since reawakening, "I wouldn't have left any of you behind if I could have helped it. I didn't plan on dying."

"But did you plan on ever letting us know you were alive, Shepard? I see you at least bothered to notify one of the old crew," he nodded in Garrus' direction. "So what was it then? Didn't want us to know you'd switched sides?"

Despite my astonishment at finding him here, despite my relief and the fine current of yearning I felt to be close to him once again and to know him the way the old Shepard had, I was slowly losing control of my temper. My motives, my actions and my very existence had all been called into question more times in the past few weeks than I cared to count. I was getting tired of it.

"I never switched sides. Cerberus is fighting for the same thing the Alliance is."

He smiled then, a mirthless quirk of the lips. "Is that what you're telling yourself?"

"What would you have me do?" I snapped.

"Come with me, back to the Alliance. Anderson would want you back, you know that."

"And what then, Kaidan? Follow orders and chase the geth around the galaxy while more human colonies disappear?" I shook my head roughly. "The real threat are the Collectors. We both know that—you saw the evidence here today."

"The Alliance can stop them just as well as Cerberus can."

"No, they can't." I paused here, riding the waves of mingled anger and frustration. I held out my hands beseechingly, trying to will him to understand what I said next. "I can't go back. There will always be rules and regulations in the Alliance that will hinder what I have to do. This isn't a game with rules anymore, Kaidan. It's a free-for-all that has to be learned as we go along and I can't do that with military restrictions. I'm sorry."

"Shepard …" As he hesitated, I steeled myself for what he would say next. It wasn't hard to guess. "You're different. You're not you anymore. The old you wouldn't work with Cerberus no matter what the stakes."

I jerked my hands back and balled my hands into fists at my sides. Those words again, so easily uttered and so damn hard for me to hear. Old Shepard and new Shepard were constantly in conflict, unable to merge entirely to become one unified being in the eyes of so many. Was I different? Of course I was, but there was enough of my old self there, buried beneath the rebuilt body and the bruised and scarred facade to feel real hurt at his accusatory words and to know with despondent finality that whatever bond Kaidan and I had shared once upon a time, it was going to die right here.

"You're not the only one to tell me that," I said tightly. I was acutely aware of Garrus standing to my left as I said those words, but I didn't glance his way. Instead, I met Kaidan's eyes and held them resolutely. "I can't prove it to you. I remember everything from before. I _am_ who I was back then. But there's no convincing you of that, is there?"

"The Alliance—"

"Where was the Alliance when my corpse was rotting on Alchera?" I'd shouted despite myself, and hearing my voice ring off the surrounding buildings I took a deep breath and made a concentrated effort to rein in the emotions that were fast becoming a tidal surge. My voice betrayed me when I continued, shaking slightly, "Tell me where they were, Kaidan. It wasn't the Alliance that recovered my body or gave me a second chance at life, was it?"

"We would have found you eventually."

"Eventually? You mean when the paperwork was processed and the protocols were followed, right? I would have been there for months at that rate. Those are exactly the reasons why I can't ever go back to the Alliance."

Another silence fell; the tensions riding the air were so thick that I'm surprised they hadn't physically manifested themselves. Behind me, Jack and Garrus remained mute, unable to avoid witnessing the catastrophic exchange between Kaidan and myself.

Kaidan moved then, stepping in close, so close that I could have reached out to him as a large part of me so longed to do. When he spoke next his voice was scarcely more than a whisper, meant for my ears alone; it was unfortunate the fact that turians had a better sense of hearing than most other races.

"Did you ever even stop to think about me after you came back, Shepard?"

_I did, of course I did_, I wanted to tell him, looking away from eyes I found suddenly too intense. I had thought about him. What I'd had with Kaidan had been the most significant relationship of my life, an exchange of emotions I'd never had time to dwell on or develop throughout my military career. I'd valued everything about him, cared for him so deeply that on many levels it was almost alarming. While I'd never had the courage or the certainty to utter that one word I viewed as completely binding, he had on several occasions danced around it as though trying to see what my reaction would be. After finding myself reborn and bereft of any people I was familiar with, I'd experienced a loneliness so profound that it frightened me. But that life, I knew instinctively, had been irrevocably altered by my death and with it so had all the intimacies that I had formed with others over the years.

I _had_ thought of him often. I had missed him. I had wondered what he was doing, how he was coping with life without me. And though I'd managed to accept that our lives had diverged and most likely would never entwine again, I couldn't help in those times I was alone to reflect back on what we'd had with each other, and wish for it as earnestly as I'd ever wished for anything.

He was still waiting for my reply, but when I brought my eyes back to his he inhaled sharply as though he'd seen the answer in the depths of my gaze. "I still think about you," I told him, but he'd already withdrawn, his expression becoming shuttered as he stepped away.

"I'll have to report this to the Alliance," he told me. "About the Collectors and finding you here. And Cerberus' involvement."

I nodded wordlessly. He retreated one step and then another before saying, "Take care of yourself, Shepard. Watch your back."

And as he turned and headed back to the control center from whence he'd came, I turned to face Garrus and Jack because I couldn't watch Kaidan walk away. Garrus' face was at its turian finest, his expression almost fierce in that it had become completely inscrutable. Jack met my eyes straight on, offered a little shrug, and then turned as though to survey our surroundings. I tapped at my omni-tool and patched through to the Normandy on the comm system. "Joker, send a shuttle. I've had enough of this place."

**.x.**


	5. Complicated Nothings

**_A/N: _**_I know it's taken a while, but there's finally an interaction of the romantic and sexual sort between Garrus and Shepard in this chapter. Sorry for making you wait._

**.5.**

**-Complicated Nothings-**

**.x.**

_If I become a martyr to the stars,_

_become a martyr to the same side _

_that I've been fighting,_

_I'm still afraid to crawl._

_[Change (Part II) - Karnivool]_

**.x.**

After mission debriefing with the rest of the team and after my report was made to the Illusive Man, I headed straight for my cabin. In the bathroom I stripped off my armor and let it fall in a dirty, stained heap in the corner before stepping into the shower. I set it so that the hot spray of water was almost punishing, every drop of uncomfortably hot water needle-like in its intensity. Lathering soap over the expanse of my body, I took stock of every imperfection I could see. Pale, parallel scars ran along my ribs, marking where a series of cybernetics had been attached to my bone structure. I knew the same type of mark ran along my spine, where they'd had to rebuild the fragile column during my reconstruction. My heart and various other internal organs had, I knew, been upgraded in similar fashions. They'd even reinforced my skull with some manner of thin yet insuperable material. Was this new and improved body of mine the reason why it was so hard for people to relate my present self to the one from my past?

I sighed. Even with all the modifications, I mused hollowly, I was still vulnerable to something as maudlin as heartache.

As I turned off the shower and began drying myself, I saw the other marks of punishment my skin bore. More scars, like unsightly blotches of paint, marked the flesh of my abdomen and legs, souvenirs from the gunship on Omega. I let fall the towel and moved until I was directly before the mirror on the wall, leaning in close to survey the contours of my face, to try and discern what Kaidan had seen when he'd looked at me.

My hair had been thick and long prior to my death, but upon my reawakening I'd been nearly bald; between being burnt as I'd fallen through the atmosphere of Alchera and the consequent modifications to my skull, I'd lost any hair I'd had. It had grown back slowly, still a dark reddish-brown in color, long enough now to fall across my brow and into my eyes. My face was lined with additional scars along the cheekbones where yet more cybernetics resided beneath the flesh. Patches of purple and yellow lined my jaw and left cheek from where I'd taken hits from Garrus. The skin beneath my eyes was bruised and dark, a testament to the fact that I wasn't sleeping as much as I should have been. My eyes themselves had been unchanged and were still a deep green, though looking at them now I wondered if they seemed emptier because of the events of the day, or because I'd lost a part of my soul somewhere in the turbulent process of my resurrection.

I shut off the light and padded barefoot and naked to the bed. As always, the sound system was on, emitting the soft, rhythmic music I needed to keep myself from falling into the recollections that threatened to swallow me. I curled up on my side, propping two pillows beneath my head, and closed my eyes. I knew immediately that attempting to sleep was just a study in futility, but I obdurately persisted in trying to will slumber upon myself for several more minutes before getting up with another sigh.

I was hurting in the ways most people hurt when the tie between themselves and the people they cared about was severed, I knew. But it still felt odd and out of place, as though because of what I'd endured I should have been above such simple human emotions. The Illusive Man had said as much, as I'd related the details of the Horizon mission to him. I'd assured him any attachments I'd had to Kaidan had been dealt with, but I think he knew as well as I did that it wasn't entirely the truth.

I didn't know how to deal with the aching void I felt in the pit of my stomach. I'd never really felt that way before. Like anyone else I'd had my share of disappointments and bouts of sadness, but this was something completely different, a kind of all-consuming malady that I couldn't shove aside or forget about. I found myself wanting to talk with someone, to attempt to empty from within me the knotted tangle of feelings that I was so ill-equipped to deal with.

And that was how I find myself in the med-bay late that night, partaking from a bottle of Serrice ice brandy with Doctor Chakwas.

The doctor, while capable of being ferociously tenacious in light of things she didn't agree with, was a genuinely wonderful person. She never hesitated to speak her mind and always invited you to do the same. I'd gotten to know her quite well during our shared time on board the original Normandy, and I knew she'd become quite close to Kaidan as well. I needed someone to listen to my side of the story, just this once—I needed someone who had known me before and after death and didn't view me from under a veil of suspicion and prejudice.

I'd seen the light on in the med-bay as I'd approached and knew from memories past that the Doctor's sleeping habits sometimes leaned towards being nocturnal. As I stepped through the door, she swiveled in her chair to see who had intruded. Upon catching sight of me she leaned back and offered me a sad, sympathetic smile.

"I heard about Kaidan," was all she said.

"I think the entire crew has." I made my way to another wheeled chair against the wall and sank down onto it, stretching my legs out in front of me.

"He was a fool, Commander."

"Maybe," I said, folding my arms under my chest and tilting my head back to stare at the lights on the ceiling. "Or maybe it really is too much to ask that people accept me as the same person I was then."

"You _are_ who you were back then." She stood and moved to a small locked cabinet on the other side of her desk. I couldn't see what she took out of it, but when she walked back around her desk she was holding a large bottle and two glasses. As she deftly removed the cork and poured, she said, "I thought he was smarter than that."

I took the glass she offered and held it up as she retook her seat. Serrice ice brandy was, as the name implied, the color of the purest natural ice, a blue so pale as to seem merely white until light filtered through it. As I brought the glass to my lips, I murmured, "So did I," before tossing back the drink in one swallow.

It burned, the good kind of burn that raced down your throat to coat and sear your belly. The doctor was being more cautious; it took three sips for her to finish hers. She rose and I handed her my glass, and as she poured another round I said, "He looked at me like I was the enemy. That's what bothers me the most. Cerberus rebuilt me and pointed me in a new direction and suddenly I'm the scourge of the galaxy, I'm just like the geth, I'm nothing good at all." I accepted the refilled glass from her and knocked it back before continuing. "He wouldn't listen to anything I had to say."

"A fool," the doctor repeated, copying my style and downing her drink in one shot. She shook her head and reached across to place a reassuring hand on my knee. "I know who you are, Shepard, and so do you. I know it doesn't change how you feel, but you should be able to find some comfort in your own convictions."

"I should be," I agreed, getting to my feet and moving to the desk where the open bottle stood. As I poured myself another, I gave her a resigned smile. "But I can't."

I brought the bottle with me as I walked back to my chair. I passed it to the doctor as I sat down; forgoing her glass, she drank deep from the bottle instead. I knew what kind of punch the ice brandy packed and I also knew that by the time it was empty, the two of us would undoubtedly be inebriated. Briefly I thought about the disapproval this would merit from Miranda and her overseer, the Illusive Man, and ultimately decided I didn't give a damn. I'd done all they'd asked of me thus far, after all; they could cut me a little slack.

"I miss him," I suddenly said aloud, surprising myself by the admittance.

"He was a good man," she replied, her eyes still clear and unclouded despite the amount of alcohol she'd just consumed. "And I'm positive he missed you too. That's why he reacted the way he did."

"It's just that this … this—" I stopped, fighting to find the right words. I took a drink of the brandy, savored the mouthful, and swallowed. "This is still surreal to me. I wonder if it will ever stop being that way. I remember who I am, I remember what I am, but sometimes its like the reality in my head and the actual truth of things is jumbled. And then Garrus and Kaidan both thinking I'm some kind of reprogrammed Cerberus drone…" I leaned back and ran a hand over my eyes. "I'm so tired of it."

"I propose a toast," the doctor said. I straightened in my seat. "To you, Commander. You're still the same amazing woman in my eyes, and you always will be."

"I can drink to that," I said with a smile that was for once genuine, and reaching out I knocked my glass against hers.

**.x.**

Sometime later—I'd understandably lost track of time—I made my way out of the med-bay in order to retire to my quarters for the night. I was intoxicated, for certain, but not to the degree I'd expected, and I wondered distantly if perhaps something done during the complex procedures of my reconstruction had heightened my tolerance to alcohol. The good doctor had not fared so well; unable to stand and slurring her words, she'd refused my offer to help her to the crew quarters and had asked instead for me to help her up onto one of the patient beds. I'd scarcely finished setting her down before her eyes had closed and her breathing had deepened, and for a moment I looked fondly down upon her as she slumbered. Her resilient faith in me was heartening and I resolved to let her know how much I appreciated her support the next time we spoke.

Outside the med-bay, the ship was mostly dark, save for the reserve lighting that illuminated the passages enough for you to find your way. I walked slowly, idly running my hand over the wall as I did so, dwelling on the simple sensation of cool metal beneath my fingers. Movement from the corridor ahead caught my attention; I stopped, let fall my hand, and focused on the figure of Garrus standing motionless some several feet away.

"Shepard."

"Garrus." I found myself reluctant to draw any closer even though to get to the elevator, I would have to pass him. "Couldn't sleep?"

"No."

"Me either." Realizing it was a little ridiculous for the two of us to be standing several feet apart while conversing, I moved closer, trying to display an air of confidence and not the light-headed hesitance I was currently feeling.

He asked, "Where were you just now?"

I half-turned and fluttered a hand in the direction of the med-bay. "With Doctor Chakwas."

"Drinking?"

I was surprised at his perceptiveness for an instant, until I remembered that with his sharp turian senses, he could most likely smell the brandy on my breath. I shrugged and nodded.

A weighty silence followed as we watched each other. The dim lighting had most of his face in shadow and I couldn't see his eyes, which unnerved me a little. Finally clearing my throat, I said, "I should be able to sleep now. Good night, Garrus."

He stepped aside to let me pass, but other than he remained still. I had almost reached the elevator when he spoke again. "Shepard … I'm sorry about Alenko. I know you two were close."

I let my head fall back as I closed my eyes. For the past short while, with the aid of the potent brandy and Chakwas' choice of deliberately distracting conversation topics, I had been able to let go of the collection of memories that had been the Kaidan of Before. The sound of his name, however, brought them all back along with the sunken, aching feeling I'd also managed to lose. I found myself suddenly angry at Garrus for ruining my escape from those emotions, however brief, even though I knew he was only trying to be kind.

Without bothering to face him, I said, "Are you? I was under the impression you're still not sure if I'm the real deal, much like Kaidan was."

He said nothing. I did turn then, to find him again blanketed in shadow, a tall and imperious figure standing motionless where I'd left him. Spurred on by the ice brandy lining my veins and coating my mind, I kept talking. "That's two old friends who don't trust me anymore. There was a time when all I'd wanted was my old team back. I'm not so sure now. You both seemed more inclined to shoot me than to follow my lead."

What I said wasn't entirely true; Garrus had proved on Horizon that he was still able to trust my abilities as a leader even if he did still question my motives. I was stricken suddenly with the desire to wound him somehow, to goad him into becoming as angry as I was. And so, I recklessly went on. "What is it that bothers you the most about the new me, Garrus? I thought I'd proven to you back then that you could trust me. I never led you astray. I never turned on you." I paused before going on, debating momentarily the wisdom of the words I was about to utter and ultimately deciding, to hell with the consequences. "But I guess a guy who inspires as much betrayal as you seem to can't help but jump at shadows, hey? I guess I can't blame you after what happened with Sidonis."

"Shut up, Shepard." His voice had dropped several octaves to a low growl that fairly resonated with warning.

But I had found a rhythm now, and the heady swirl of rage and inebriation allowed me to plow on fearlessly. "I've got to know, how did you not see it coming? You seemed so cautious and wary when we worked together, I'm surprised Sidonis managed to pull one over on you like he did. Maybe if you'd done as Joker suggested that time and pulled that stick out of your ass—"

I'd wanted to provoke him and I had. He approached me so swiftly that all I had time to do was move blindly backwards and gasp as, unexpectedly, I found the unyielding wall of the corridor at my back. He didn't halt until he was mere inches from me, leaning down so that his face was directly before mine. Even in the faint light I could see the furious glow in his eyes; his crest was flared and rigid and everything about the stiff, tautly controlled way he was standing suggested he was doing all he could not to strike me.

"You," he said in a whisper that trembled with the raw force of his rage, "have no idea what happened with Sidonis."

"I know enough," I replied, aware that I had gone too far and too caught up in the rise and swell my own alcohol-fueled righteous indignation to care.

"And what about you, Shepard? Surely you didn't think Kaidan would come running back to your open arms after you'd died and left him all alone?"

"Fuck you, Garrus." Acting on the simple, blunt machinations of my own fury, I shoved him hard. He stumbled back several feet, regained his balance, and lunged for me. I could have whirled and ran, I could have tried to avoid his rush, I could have just met his charge with one of my own; instead I stood completely still while both his hands slammed flat against the wall on either side of my head.

He was breathing hard and fast; it was difficult for any turian to rein in that inherent instinct to lash out and wound when angered and I imagined it was doubly so for Garrus given the complicated set of circumstances. I'd crossed the line long ago but I couldn't seem to care. Even in the face of his formidable wrath, I found myself saying more words I really shouldn't have said.

"So what happened, then? Were you so caught up in your avenging angel charade that you were blind to everything else? What made you miss the traitor in your midst?"

"_It was you!_" he shouted. Those three words bounced with terrible vehemence off the walls of the enclosed corridor. Wide-eyed, I watched as he dropped his head and leaned forward, bracing himself with his hands that were still laid flat against the wall. He seemed to deflate, as if that chaotic turmoil of madness I'd incited to life within him had simply withered and died. When he lifted his head all the fire had left his eyes, leaving them barren of any emotion I recognized.

"After you died it was all I could think about. There were things about you I never realized I'd noticed until you were gone. It was consuming me, Shepard, thinking about you and the things I never did." He paused, lowered his gaze and closed his eyes. "And the things I never said. I went to Omega to try and drive it all out of my head, to try and focus on another cause, another reason. I wanted revenge against someone—anyone—for your death. Someone had to pay. And even though I threw all I had into pissing off those mercs and killing those scum, you still followed me there."

"Garrus," I whispered, a piercing ache growing in my chest.

"That's how it happened. That's how Sidonis turned without my noticing. I'd been able to organize a group of successful vigilantes and decimate entire merc companies, but I couldn't succeed at forgetting about you. My vendetta against the universe began to control me. I lost sight of the crucial things, like the possibility of a traitor in my ranks."

I had nothing to say. I understood, finally, why he'd become so tightly wound, so unable to accept me as the person he'd once knew. Driven by compassion and an unfamiliar sorrow, I lifted a hand and laid my palm against his face. He leaned into my touch, eyes opening to once more focus upon me.

"I'm sorry," I told him, hating how those words couldn't even begin to convey the guilt I was feeling. I'd been so intent on wounding him that I hadn't been able, in my haze of anger, to realize that maybe the reason behind his reservations about me lay a wellspring of secrets and sentiments he'd been fighting to deal with since I'd died. But then I remembered how I'd been hurt and outraged by his unwillingness to recognize the person I was now was also the person I had been, and I let my hand fall to hang at my side.

"I'm sorry," I said again. "I am. I didn't know. I shouldn't have said those things. But, Garrus," I paused and straightened, trying to convey my conviction even though I felt weak inside, "I can't work with you if you can't accept that I'm the same person I was. I won't work with you. I need you to trust me the way you used to."

"I do."

I searched his face to try and discern if he meant what he said. His hands, still in place on either side of my head, flexed slightly as he spoke again, "I do trust you, Shepard. I've been an idiot and an ass. Truth be told, I knew it was you the moment you first hit me down in the cargo hold."

Somehow, he'd gotten even closer to me. My vision was filled with the strong, haughty lines of his face and the linear strands of his markings but it was his eyes that caught and held my attention as they began to glow again with that enigmatic inner light I'd seen before, but had been unable to identify.

"Oh?" I asked quietly, trying to maintain a coherent train of thought in the wake of the confusion his proximity had brought upon me.

He nodded, the edges of his mouth pulling up into a small smile. "I knew it was the real you because you never pull a punch. Or hesitate to fight dirty."

I couldn't stop the answering smile from alighting on my lips, wasn't sure that I wanted to. "If I'd really wanted to fight dirty, turian, you'd be a cripple right now."

He breathed a soft laugh at that. And then, without my fully being aware of what I was doing, I stepped forwards, stepped into him, and exulted when his hesitant arms enclosed around me. Maybe I was still drunk. Maybe I was overwhelmed by relief that we'd finally managed to clear the tensions between us. Maybe it was just what I needed and wanted to do, to turn my head against his chest, to rise up on the balls of my feet, to brush my lips as lightly as I could across the line of his jaw and down his neck.

"Shepard ..."

This was crazy. This was unwise. But this was also an urge that had welled up so suddenly and so swiftly that I couldn't help but go along with it. Garrus was no human and I knew that turians valued honor, obedience and strength; with that last quality in mind, I let my mouth rest at the juncture of his neck and shoulder, exposed by the wide cowl of his uniform. For a moment I paused, feeling his pulse thundering against my lips. And then, without giving warning, I opened my mouth and nipped hard at his flesh.

He groaned, a sound that rolled up from the depths of his being and spilled from him unchecked. His arms tightened around me, crushing me to him, and for the second time I became aware of the strangely pleasing juxtaposition of the sharp, hard angles of his body and the soft curves of my own. He pulled back a little, reaching up to catch my chin in his three-fingered grasp and turn my face to his. So fiercely ardent was the look in his eyes that I missed a breath, and when he pulled me close again and brushed the rough skin of his cheek against mine I closed my eyes. I felt him catch the skin of my neck between his teeth and I stiffened in expectation; he bit down slowly and I couldn't help the shudder that worked its way up my spine, nor my soundless gasp.

I wanted more of this—I wanted it all. And judging from the way he was holding me and his rapid, uneven breathing, he did too. But he lifted his hands to my shoulders and gently pushed me away; when I looked a question at him, he shook his head with a shaky, rueful laugh.

"You're drunk, Shepard … I'd rather we finish this when you're sober. And naked. And preferably someplace other than the middle of the ship ..."

"I'm sober enough to remember all this in the morning," I told him; finding it suddenly hard to stand on my own merit, I sank back against the wall and lifted a hand to run my fingers over the wet, tingling patch of skin where he'd marked me.

"Good." The heat in his gaze made my rubbery legs feel weaker still. "I want you to remember this."

It was my turn to give a faint laugh. "I don't think you have to worry about me forgetting."

There were in the moment that followed many things I wanted to do, all of them consisting of me touching parts of him. Instead, I mustered my strength, pushed off from the wall, and inclined my head in his direction. I was happy to find my voice was only slightly unsteady as I spoke. "I'll be off to bed, then. Good night, Garrus."

He was still smiling when I stepped into the elevator.

**.x.**


	6. Incubus Corporeal

**.6.**

**- Incubus Corporeal -**

**.x.**

_You've got to let me dream_

_inside you, baby._

_[Razorblade Kiss – HIM]_

**.x.**

I awoke as the side of the bed next to me sank under a sudden weight. My eyes flew open and my arm shot sideways, fumbling for the handgun that always lay on the bedside table. Someone was leaning over me and strange fingers caught my wrist, halting my blind search for my weapon. I blinked once, twice, trying to clear the haze caused by both my earlier excess of drink and the remnants of a deep slumber.

"Garrus?" I mumbled, thoroughly confused.

He hadn't removed his hand from where it was wrapped around my wrist and was on his knees, looming over my supine form. He remained quiet but slowly and purposefully pushed my captive arm up over my head and into the pillow upon which my head rested. His eyes were hooded, their intent wholly hidden to me, but remembering with a jolt just what had transpired on the deck below only a short time before, I knew immediately why he'd come.

I felt a multitude of things in the heartbeats that followed. Foremost among them was a surging, near-overwhelming anticipation that made it hard to breathe. But I was still confused; he'd refused me earlier, hadn't he? And so I asked with a voice made husky by sleep and other, more primitive things, "Garrus? What are you doing here?"

"I don't want to wait," he said thickly; the flanging was more prominent now, more raw than I'd ever heard it before. He released my his hold on my wrist but I didn't move my arm. Instead I watched, my heart pounding wildly, as he placed his other hand flat on my stomach and slid it beneath the thin fabric of the simple shift I wore. The sensation of his skin, thick and unyielding against my own caused a string of shivers to worm their way from the point of contact between us up the rest of my body.

Haltingly, trying very hard to be coherent, I asked, "Are _you_ drunk?"

A quiet laugh escaped him. He shook his head. "Hush," he said softly, and began moving his hand further beneath my shift in a slow and deliberate slide.

It was torture he'd planned on, I realized in the agonizing seconds that followed, as I lay unmoving and his touch climbed higher and higher inch by thorough inch. I didn't want to wait—the thought was an echo to his previous words. I wanted him biting me, wanted him claiming me, wanted him to just go ahead and fuck me with all the power and unbridled passion I knew he now possessed.

I opened my mouth to tell him as much, but he stalled me by swiftly leaning down and licking a searing, sinuous path that traced the lines of my jaw and neck. Startled, I squirmed; his breath tickled at the sensitive hollow of my throat as he spoke.

"Keep still, Shepard."

It was a difficult order to obey as his hand resumed its crawl, reaching the swell of one breast and gliding slowly over it. As his palm dragged over my hardened nipple, he stopped; I made a primal, desperate sound and was unable to stop from pushing myself up into his touch. I felt his breath again, felt the slight, pleasing pain of his teeth nipping at my flesh, and I was helpless to prevent the soft, near-soundless exhale of breath that left me in a lengthy sigh.

His hand had cupped my breast and as he trailed more small, precise bites along the curve of my shoulder, he ran a thumb over my nipple in a back-and-forth pattern that had me digging my hands into the twisted sheets I lay upon. In a sudden movement, Garrus reared back; I stared up at him, perplexed. Even though he was shrouded by shadow, I caught the quick and feral flash of teeth as he smiled.

"Up." Was all he said.

I complied, propping myself up on my elbows, pausing as I felt suddenly unsure and shy, before sitting up entirely. He caught the bottom hem of my shift and pulled upwards; I lifted my arms to assist as he removed the garment from me in a quick, seamless maneuver. His hands were on me again instantly, pushing me back down and I surrendered willingly, sinking back into the welcoming mattress. His tongue began to glide in a complex, swirling pattern across my skin, down from my neck until it found unerringly the gentle rise of my breast. I sucked in a breath as that facile tongue laved across one nipple, places low in my body suddenly being suffused with an exhilarating rush of tingling heat. I felt those deceptively sharp teeth close gently around one pebbled nipple and couldn't help the way my body jerked or the way his name exploded from my mouth.

"_Garrus!_"

"Shepard," he rumbled around my nipple; I could feel the dual-tones of his voice vibrating against my flesh made moist by his mouth, could sense rather than see his playful smile. He continued to ply his torture, alternating tongue and teeth, while his hand reversed its earlier path, moving downwards in a slow and insidious exploration.

So many thoughts were jumbled in my mind; I wondered how he knew exactly where to touch me, wondered how he knew human anatomy so well. I wondered if he'd mind that I didn't really know how to touch him in kind, even though I planned on discovering every sensitive part of him with dedicated fervor. And I wondered, as the fingers of his wandering hand honed in on that part of me that was throbbing and oh-so-wet, if he'd fuck me when I started to beg.

"Commander?"

A different voice, intruding loudly on my erotically charged haze of thought. And as my eyes opened to find the dark confines of my room bereft of anyone other than myself, I turned my face into my pillow and groaned.

"Commander Shepard? We've arrived at Illium."

My voice was hoarse from sleep and the lingering vestiges of what I'd been feeling in the dream. "Thank you, Joker. I'll be right down. Go ahead and dock the Normandy."

It was a long span of minutes before I could move, my body still charged with electric warmth, my skin still dancing with pinpricks of feeling. When I finally did roll over into a sitting position at the side of the bed, the thought that occurred to me brought a smile to my face.

This was the first time since I'd been remade that I hadn't dreamed of silence.

**.x.**

_** A/N: **__Sorry so short. More of this to come, I promise!_


	7. A Near Halcyon Day

_**A/N:** It's been a year since I updated this fic, and for that I apologize. I've recently started playing ME2 again (and have been experiencing periodic bouts of excitement regarding ME3) and it restarted my motivation. I would dearly like to have this fic reach its conclusion before the launch of ME3 in March. I'm sorry again for the hiatus, and I hope you enjoy the rest of the story!_

* * *

**.7.**

**-A Near Halcyon Day-**

**.x. **

_A favor, Captain, a word with you_

_I fear I've gone and lost my mind._

_My right eye has done shed a tear._

_My gun I've left behind._

_[IRO-Bot – Coheed & Cambria]_

**.x.**

Apparently my lack of sleep, accompanied by the way the world would reel around me at odd moments (I staunchly refused to acknowledge this as a hangover), delayed me more than I realized. Striding up the length of the CIC towards the Normandy's airlock, still working on the fastenings of my hardsuit, I glanced up and hesitated briefly as I saw that the entirety of my team was already there waiting for me. Feeling unaccountably awkward and wondering how long they'd all been waiting, I came to a halt before them and nodded my greeting.

"You're late, Shepard." Garrus remarked in an easy, conversational tone. "Long night?"

I'd been pointedly trying to avoid looking at him, but this remark snapped my eyes to him. His expression was nearly blank, save for the way one corner of his mouth quirked slightly upwards. I was relatively sure that the others had no idea what had transpired between us and I was hoping they would think his words to be mere banter. I thought about what he was really referring to—our short, intense interaction in the corridor the night before—and then found myself recalling the dream that had followed hours later. Immediately I felt heat rise to my face; I made a show of tinkering with my omni-tool while inwardly I fiercely willed the color in my cheeks to recede.

My predicament seemed to go unnoticed. "How much leave do we get here?" Jack demanded.

Feeling somewhat more in control of my emotions, which appeared to have reverted to that of a sixteen-year old girl, I replied after only a short consideration. "I need to gather some intel before we do anything else. Take six hours. Convene back here."

That was all the dismissal my team needed. The airlock having opened, they filed through one after the other. I stepped into the bridge to speak with Joker and EDI in order to discern more about this planet I'd never before visited and our purpose here. The Illusive Man had informed me that my old teammate Liara was situated on Ilium, but he'd also alluded that she may be working for the Shadow Broker. Despite that last piece of information, I had already decided that Liara would be my first stop. My mysterious benefactor had also given me dossiers for two individuals also currently on Ilium, both of which he seemed to think would make valuable additions to my team. I'd resolved that I would be the only one to make that particular decision.

Turning, I left Joker and EDI to what had become their usual bickering. I came to an abrupt halt, however, when I found that Garrus was still waiting by the airlock.

"Vakarian," I greeted, deciding to take the offensive. I ran my eye over him in a slow perusal, top to bottom and back again, finishing by meeting his eyes with a grin. I wasn't entirely certain even now where we stood with each other but I was certain that whatever doubts he'd had about me, and those I'd had about him, had been completely assuaged. I was to him only Shepard—past and current selves reconciled—and my own uncertainties had faded, chased away by the fervency of the words he'd spoken the night before. Now, standing face to face with him I became aware that I felt lighter and freer than I had in a very long time. Beyond this point the universe was dark and foreboding and a great deal of tribulation awaited us, but for right now I could and would indulge in this bit of harmless whimsy.

The ridges above his eyes lifted in an inquisitive manner. "Shepard," he said, and I could hear the undercurrent of amusement in his voice. "Like what you see?"

I didn't bother to answer; still smiling I said instead, "You've got six hours leave, Garrus. Surely you're not going to spend them all on-board?"

"Oh, I've got plans."

"Really?" I asked, moving to the airlock. As the door hissed open he fell into step beside me and together we exited the Normandy.

"Really." He affirmed. As we stepped into an empty, all-white corridor, he continued. "You know, of course, about my affinity for high-class institutions of dance?"

"I may have heard you mention it once or twice before," I said as we began to walk, following the bright, pulsing neon blue arrows that adorned the walls, directing us outward to the trading floor of the city.

"I hear tell of one such establishment here in Nos Astra."

"I hope," I told him, slanting an amused glance his way, "that you brought a healthy supply of credit chits with you. For showing your, ah ... appreciation for the art."

"I'm well prepared, Commander." He intoned with such austerity that I couldn't help the muffled snort of laughter that escaped me. "I'm sure you are, Garrus."

We'd exited the docking zone of Nos Astra and had entered the city proper. Around us was a hub of asari civilization, tall, elegant pale buildings adorned with myriad lights, streets of white and almost everywhere the blue-skinned asari mixed with a variety of other species. It was a beautiful place, the architecture delicate and precise and the entire atmosphere being one of serene calm. Which was not, I knew, the actual case; EDI and Joker had filled me in on the actual situation of Nos Astra—it was just as unruly and corrupt as Omega, but with much finer trappings.

As Garrus looked out over the view before us, I checked my omni-tool for the data EDI had uploaded prior to my disembarking. I found the route to take in order to find Liara, memorized it, and looked back to the turian. He was watching me quietly, his expression now solemn. I raised a brow in silent question.

"You're all right with ... everything?" He asked. "We didn't really discuss ...everything, and I was concerned that maybe—"

"I'm fine." I assured him, touching him lightly on the arm. Aware that there were people all around us and wishing that there wasn't, I added, "You?"

His gravitas vanished and in its place appeared a demeanor was entirely turian: confident, smug and a little bit predatory. "Better than fine. I mean to finish what we started, Shepard."

And just like that, I was weak in the knees. Remembering vividly just what we _had_ started and also remembering—just as vividly—what we'd continued in my dream, I felt heat rushing to my face once more. Here in broad daylight, it wouldn't be as easy to hide—

"You're blushing, Commander."

_Goddamnit_. "I need to find Liara," I said, adopting an unconcerned air and making to step past him. But at the last moment I hesitated, casting a swift, surreptitious glance around before stepping in as close as I could without actually touching him. He was only a bit taller than I, but this close I had to crane my head back in order to meet his gaze. "I dreamed of you," I said softly. "And of continuing what we'd begun."

" ... did you?" His voice dropped in volume and was now barely audible. The heat was back in his eyes again, the same hungry glow I'd witnessed the night before and it was doing remarkable things to the rate of my pulse.

I nodded and swallowed. I'd meant to tease him, but hadn't gambled on how strong his effect on me would already be this early into our situation, arrangement, whatever you wanted to call it. It was all a bit alarming. Never one to back down, however, I went on. "You and I, Garrus—never doubt that I don't want it."

The corners of his mouth tightened and he inhaled deeply, as though steeling himself against a surge of emotion. I knew exactly how he felt. "You," he told me in a voice so low it had become a rolling growl, "had better be on your way."

I stepped back, my smile a shaky one, finding that while I did gain clarity after distancing myself from him, it was nowhere near to the degree I needed it to be. "What if I stayed?" I asked him, certain I already knew the answer but wanting to hear it all the same.

"Then the entirety of Nos Astra and most of your crew are going to witness my dragging you back to the Normandy."

"Noted," I said, backing another several steps. "I'll see you in a few hours, Vakarian."

**.x.**

It's funny how bad news can chase away even the most pleasant of moods.

My reunion with Liara, while initially filled with happy sentiments, quickly fouled as she explained to me in her soft and urgent voice just all that had transpired in the two years that I'd been dead. Cerberus—or more specifically, the Illusive Man—had not been completely honest with me. Had been far from honest, in fact. Leaning back in the uncomfortable chair situated on the other side of her desk, I listened with a growing feeling of mixed dread and dismay as she informed me on things I had every right to know.

Cerberus had not been the first to recover my body. It had been agents of the Shadow Broker that had first found my charred, crushed corpse on Alchera. The recovery of my remains had been part of a transaction between the Broker and the Collectors—

"But why?" I demanded of my asari friend, utterly mystified by this last piece of information.

"I don't know, Shepard, but for the Shadow Broker to have gone to such extreme lengths to secure your body, the Collectors must have been paying well. And don't ask me what they paid," she said, shaking her head slowly as I opened my mouth to voice that very question, "because I have no idea. It must have been something very, very good, more than just credits."

It had been Liara and a close friend of hers, a drell she refused to name, that had rescued my corpse from the Shadow Broker. I got the impression from her as she spoke—from the long pauses and hesitations strewn throughout her words—that there had been some manner of betrayal included in the quest to take back my body, but I didn't want to pry. Cerberus, upon learning that my remains were then safely in Liara's posession, had offered her a deal she couldn't refuse: they'd bring me back to life.

"And here you are," she said with a smile that managed to be both sweet and sad. When I asked her the reason for her sorrow, she shook her head, telling me that things were too complicated at the time to explain fully, but letting me know that someday in the near future she may need my assistance. I promised her anything she needed; I owed her that and far more after the lengths she'd gone to to bring me back from the Collectors.

"I can't tell you how glad I am to see you," she told me, coming around her desk to give me a long embrace.

"Likewise," I said with the utmost honesty. "This rebirth bullshit isn't all it's cracked up to be. It's good to see a familiar face."

She didn't smile, but touched me lightly on the cheek before stepping away. "Be careful, Shepard. Watch your back."

Outside her office, back on the busy trading floor of Nos Astra, I found that I could no longer appreciate the idyllic scenery or the magnificent sunset-bathed skyline visible from the open-air balcony the market was situated upon. My thoughts were focused only on the grimmest of tidings Liara had given me.

The Collectors had wanted my corpse.

**.x.**

Hours later, long after the sun had set on Ilium and most my team had retired for the night, I ventured to Normandy's main battery. Garrus was awake, as I knew he would be; I'd learned during our previous mission to stop Saren that he slept far less than most, able to function well on only small amounts of sleep. He stood as he usually did at the main control panel for the battery and weapons systems, his back to the only entrance. Hearing the telltale hiss of the doors brought him around and upon seeing who had entered, his expression relaxed from that of complete concentration into one of pleasant surprise.

"You're up late."

"Couldn't sleep."

"I'm willing to bet I know wh—" He stopped abruptly, alerted to my state of discontent by my subdued expression. "Shepard? What's wrong?"

I'd crossed the floor to sit upon a small metal crate. Earlier in the day I'd been a raging mass of hormones, excited and delighted by the attraction that we shared for each other and the fact that it was something that made me feel real, made me feel I was no longer a stranger living somebody else's life. The discussion with Liara had throttled those emotions and now all I felt was a heavy, strangling sense of foreboding knowing the Collectors had wanted me so bad they'd been willing to scrape my corpse off the surface of Alchera.

Garrus had remained by the control panel. Leaning back against it, regarding me steadily, he said only, "Tell me."

And so I did, laying out all Liara had relayed to me, point by point. I hesitated a moment before going on to tell him that this new information was haunting me, that I had now a new reason to fear the Collectors—the overwhelming, chilling fear of the unknown.

"Because," I told him in a flat voice, my eyes glued to the steel grating of the battery's floor, "they didn't just want my corpse as a trophy. So what the fuck _did_ they want it for?"

"Shepard, I—"

"If Cerberus was able to rebuild me, then it's a guaranteed fact the Collectors have the ability to do so as well. Miranda told me she wanted to insert a control mechanism into my brain before bringing me back ... Garrus, what if that's what the Collectors had intended? What if they had planned on bringing me back as some kind of fucking hybrid creation under their control?"

"You can't know that's what they intended."

"You can't know it's not!" I snapped back, then sighed, rubbing at my eyes with one hand. "I'm sorry. You're right, there's no way to know. I just can't stop thinking about this."

"You're afraid," he said quietly.

"Terrified." I acknowledged. I lifted my eyes then, to find him watching me, his expression grave. I took a deep breath, let it out, and made the choice to do what I'd earlier decided never to do. I said, "I'm not over what happened, not even the least bit. I still dream about it—about the Normandy going down, about my hardsuit's oxygen hose rupturing—"

"You don't have to tell me this."

"I do. Garrus. This ... whatever we have between us, it won't work if I don't explain. I dream about it. I relive it. I remember not being able to breathe, I remember burning—and all of it happening in silence. I can't," I said tersely, rising to my feet and pacing a line to the door and back, "stand the quiet anymore. I need noise to feel safe. Fuck, I need it just to sleep."

I kept walking. At the door again, I turned and leaned back, bringing my arms tight across my midsection. Watching him watching me, I continued my stilted, disjointed explanation. "Cerberus thinks I'm sound of mind. It's why they let me have this ship and this crew. But I don't think I am, Garrus. I remember the way I used to be, before I—before. I remember you, and the things we talked about, but I don't feel like I did then. I feel ..." I paused, searching for some manner of word to explain all the convoluted, frustrating emotions I had been experiencing since the very moment I'd opened my eyes back on that Cerberus base. Exasperated, I fluttered a hand in the air. "You were right to doubt me, before—to doubt that I was who I used to be. I told you that I was the same but I'm not sure. I haven't been sure since I came back."

He pushed himself away from the console, took a step towards me. I help up the same hand and began to talk faster, needing now to finish what I'd started, needing him to know what had been happening to me. "I wanted you to know this, before—_if_—we take whatever we have between us any further. I owe you that ... you deserve that much."

"Come here." Was all he said in reply.

I complied, approaching hesitantly. All that I'd just said had not been a good portrayal of an adept and competent leader, or even a woman in a secure state of mind. I stopped when I was at arm's length, looking up at him and wondering if I'd shot our chances all to hell with my big reveal and simultaneously hating that I was so goddamn insecure. I'd taken out Saren, for fuck sakes ...

He didn't reach for me. He began to speak instead, his voice low and even. "This changes nothing. I knew you were suffering, somehow. I'd have had to been blind not to know, Shepard. I'd hoped, that day in the med-bay, after you found me on Omega ..." He trailed off, not needing to say the rest. After a moment he went on, "But you've told me now. And I can't understand what it's like, to be you after all that's happened. But, Shepard ..."

I felt his fingers ghosting against my cheek and I turned into their touch; they brushed downwards slowly, finally curving about the back of my neck. Obeying his silent command I took the two steps needed to be right before him, tilting my head back to meet his gaze.

"You're the only Shepard, the _right_ Shepard. I know it, and I think you do too. I'll follow you, I'll fight for you—hell, given our odds, I'll probably even die with you. And this ... _thing_, we've got going on between us ... I still want it. I promise you this."

I closed my eyes as relief crashed over me. Garrus, my only secure link to the life I'd had Before—my confession hadn't phased him at all. The way I felt for him and the way he felt for me were, in the grand scheme of this insane quest we'd landed in, small things, insignificant when compared to the actual scope. But it was important to me to know I had a connection with someone who'd known me before I'd died and come back, and even more important because it was with someone I had come to know better than any other and had come to trust implicitly throughout our shared trials and tribulations. I needed what we had to keep myself grounded against the doubts that I harbored about myself. I needed it to maintain clarity when faced with the Collectors, the Reapers, the geth—

Garrus' fingers flexed, the texture of his skin hard, rough and pleasant against my own. He moved closer, until our bodies touched, until my vision consisted solely of the angular, fierce planes of his face. "Thank you," I told him, my voice trembling slightly under the weight of my relief. "And you—us—I told you I wanted it. I meant it."

The corners of his mouth curved upwards slowly into that one particular smile—confident, playful and a little edged—that I was really beginning to like. "But," I said, "I have to admit something."

"Oh?"

"I don't really have any idea about how to ..." Well, this was awkward. I cleared my throat and shook my head, deciding to soldier on through. "Look, I don't know much—or anything at all, actually—about turian anatomy. So as much as I may want to ... you know, I don't really know how to make it work. Being as we're different species, and all."

He chuckled. "That's kind of a relief, Shepard."

I echoed his earlier question. "Oh?"

He nodded. "I don't know much about human anatomy, either. Well," he amended, "I know more after last night than I did before. Did you know the datanet has very thorough and instructive tutorials on how to please human women?"

I couldn't help but laugh. He kept talking, his smile becoming wider. "We'll figure out a way to make it happen. Human females seem less inclined to cause injury while in the throes of passion than turian women. I bet if I ask Mordin—"

"Please don't."

"—he'd be able to provide us with information on positions, precautions, preventative stretches to do beforehand ..."

"Sounds like a lot work, Garrus."

"It does," he agreed amenably. "But I'm alright with that. In fact, I'd really like to get started ..."

I was unprepared for what he did then. With his free hand he grabbed me tightly against the waist, spinning me around so quickly I made a startled sound before shoving me against the console. The fingers previously curved about my neck moved upwards to knot in the short lengths of my hair. He pressed himself against me, in a way that left no doubt in my mind whatsoever that he wanted what I wanted, and just as badly. Pulling my head back so that my neck was exposed, he leaned down so that I could feel his breath, hot and rapid, against my neck. My entire body went rigid, expecting to feel that enticing, piercing pleasure-pain of his needle-like teeth; I sucked in a sudden breath as I felt instead the warm moisture of his tongue at the juncture of my shoulder and neck.

It was just like my dream; it was so much better than my dream. His tongue was rough, pebbled and as it dragged against my flesh I felt an answering heat growing in places much lower. As though knowing what I was feeling, he shoved himself against me hard, pinioning me between the console and the just as unyielding length of his body. His hands began to move, sliding upwards from my waist in a caress that was near brutal in its intensity, rising over my ribs until they met with the swell of my breasts. A short pause then before they continued their perusal, gliding roughly over nipples that I knew he could tell were hard despite the interfering layer of my uniform. I squirmed and he gave into my silent and fervent command, sharply, possessively marking my skin with his teeth. I clutched at his arms as everything around me reeled; there was no questioning now, despite how different our anatomies actually were, whether or not he was aroused. I couldn't help the way I pushed back against him or the soft noise of supplication I made, which became a drawn out exhale of breath in the form of his name as, finally, his mouth made its way up my neck to nip and suck at my lower lip.

And then he was gone, stepping away so fast that I had to reach behind me to grasp hard at the edges of the console to keep myself from toppling over. I eyed him with a mixture of disbelief and carnal greed, my pulse thundering in my ears and my body throbbing with a resonating heat. He was breathing just as fast as I was, his posture rigid as though he was fighting not to leap at me, which I knew was exactly the case. Not yet capable of coherent speech, I made strangled sound that was half question and half plea.

"... but not tonight." He rasped, completing his last sentence.

"You're a bastard, Vakarian," I swore, pushing away from the console and finding that my legs still shook with the enormity of the reactions he'd incited to life within me.

Again came that smile, a feral quirk of the lips that made me think of all things wanton. "You should turn in, Commander. Long day ahead of us."

My laughter was breathy, my voice wavering. "You won't be able to sleep, no more than I will."

He turned on the spot to watch my progress towards the door. To my credit, I managed to keep myself going in a straight line. "No," he agreed, his voice both gravelled and husky at once—a combination I quite liked. "But that's alright. I have some research to do on the datanet."

I'm still not sure how I had enough willpower to make it out that door.

**.x.**


	8. Schism

**.8.**

**-Schism-**

**.x. **

_We're now up here alone, terror on the intercom._

_Can someone save us?_

_Systems malfunction—blast it, this damn machine!_

_Over and out, Captain._

_[Delirium Trigger – Coheed & Cambria]_

**.x.**

The next day ushered in the grim reality that we had all come to share.

To search out and recruit the asari Justicar Samara, I chose Grunt and Mordin for my team. We moved quickly, departing from the Normandy before the sun had risen on Ilium, using the intel Liara had provided me with to track Samara down in an area of Nos Astra dominated by the presence of a branch of the Eclipse known as the Sisters. Much like every other task I'd undertaken since becoming a Spectre, recruiting Samara was more difficult than initially expected. Long hours later, after having infiltrated the Eclipse base and battling our way through to find the information Samara needed, I found myself in the surprising position of witnessing a Justicar swear to follow me wherever my mission may take me.

I'd read the dossier on Samara supplied to me by the Illusive Man, but found that the compilation of bland, unimaginative statements had done little to actually capture the essence of who and what she was. She was beautiful, of course, as most all the asari were, but further distinguished herself by exuding the easy authority of someone who lived beyond the laws of most civilizations. Some would call this simple arrogance; I suspected it was more complex than that. Despite that fact, Samara also carried about her a kind of serenity, a sense of absolute peace with herself and the rest of the universe and I found myself drawn to it, as I had little of either. Added to this potent, somewhat disarming mix was the considerable power of her biotics; after having witnessed the full extent of said powers I found myself regarding her with new respect. Even Grunt, ever fearless and belligerent, gave way before the Justicar as she approached to kneel before us and take the oath to bind herself to my service.

With Samara secured, our next objective was to recruit a drell assassin known as Thane Krios. I made the decision to hammer out this mission immediately following the resolution of the other, and after a very brief rendezvous at the Normandy, Grunt, Mordin and I returned to the streets of Nos Astra.

The assassin proved to be nearly as difficult to recruit as the Justicar. In the end it was a race—either we reached him first, or he'd fall prey to the formidable security team of the woman he'd come to assassinate. In the end, he accomplished his goal, gunning down the powerful asari businesswoman with fluidic ease in front of me, my team, and an escort of the asari's hired mercenary guards. When all was said and done, Thane Krios agreed to join our cause. It was only as I'd turned around to exit the room, relieved that this particular obstacle was over, that he dropped the bombshell the Illusive Man had seen fit to omit from the relevant dossier.

"I'm dying." The drell told me calmly.

Pivoting to face him, I replied with my first thought, "Is it contagious?"

A brief shake of his head. "No. If you wish to know more, we can discuss it on board your ship."

Grunt and Mordin were waiting for me at the double doors leading to this killing ground, an expansive high-rise office overlooking the spectacular, twinkling night-scape that was Nos Astra after dark. I remained where I was, considering the newest member of my crew. He stood comfortably beneath my scrutiny, his bearing one of inherent self-assurance. He wasn't as tall as Garrus, even in height with me or perhaps a bit taller, clad in skin-hugging synthetic leather weave that revealed a build that was both lean and muscular. Not having been this close to any drell before, I was intrigued by his features, curious about a species that was still relatively new to me. The reptilian texture and mottled colors of his skin were unlike that of most any other alien race I'd come across, but I found my attention focusing on the large eyes that dominated his face: they were an inky black that seemed impenetrable but the faint outline of iris and pupil, managing to be both reticent and expressive at the same time.

He was, in a word, interesting, and I'd seen first hand the proof of his prowess. But if he was terminally ill as he'd indicated, could he still be a valuable asset to my team? He appeared in the peak of health, but I was neither a doctor nor familiar with drell. It was on the tip of my tongue to tell him that there were better ways to spend his last days than taking on foes as indomitable as the Collectors and Reapers, but he spoke first as though able to predict my thoughts.

"My condition has not yet progressed to the point where it is debilitating. I am still physically capable. I believe you've seen what I can do."

His voice was arresting, sounding as though a normal voice, low and rich, had been poured over sand and assailed by dry winds. I narrowed my eyes as I thought quickly. In a battle such as the one we would inevitably face, we would need every able bodied individual we could get. But still I hesitated; there were numerous dire and gruesome fates awaiting us should we fail and it didn't sit well with me to be the one to send a dying man to such an end. And despite how petty it made me seem, a large part of me wanted to leave him behind simply because the Illusive Man had once again withheld crucial information from me.

Krios was silent, awaiting my final judgement. Finally I nodded my assent. "But," I warned, holding up one hand, "I want you to report to the medical lab once you're on board the Normandy for a full diagnostic scan. Nothing personal, but I need to know what shape you're in."

"Understood."

And so it was that where three had left the Normandy, four returned. Despite the desperate odds, my team was growing.

**.x.**

The Normandy departed Ilium soon after our return, once I'd introduced Thane to Jacob and left him to find the drell suitable accommodations. From there I headed to the CIC, writing my report to the Illusive Man, mulishly transmitting it over the extranet rather than through the holographic correspondence we usually used. By the time I'd finished summarizing the recruitment of Justicar and assassin we had long since left Ilium behind and had embarked on a mining run, scanning remote planets throughout the Terminus systems for resources and dispatching probes to collect whatever we could find. We'd accumulated several upgrades for the Normandy in Nos Astra, but lacked the materials to implement them. After a visit to Joker on the bridge to ascertain all was in order, I made my way to my cabin in order to catch up on much needed sleep.

I could have gone to Garrus, instead; I very much wanted to. I knew that what we both wanted—a release to our combined sexual tensions that promised to be at the very least wildly spectacular—would have to wait. It was a diversion neither of us could afford at this point—hell, just thinking of what had already transpired between he and I had been causing my mind to wander at inopportune moments. The Reapers and their Collector puppets where an unavoidable conclusion to the road I'd been reborn to walk. I didn't like it. I didn't want it to be that way. But I couldn't change it, either. Lives depended on my ability to lead, on my team's ability to maintain their clarity and resolution throughout all conflicts we would find ourselves in. For those reasons, I had to deny myself that which I suspected I needed more than I desired. For those reasons, I couldn't partake of that intensely powerful intimacy between us that waited and begged to be discovered.

I knew that Garrus would agree with me despite the way he felt. He'd been an officer long enough to know that the mission came first, especially when the stakes were as high as these. Still I wanted nothing more than to pay another late night visit to the main battery, to witness my effect on him and experience his on me, to see what more might happen in close proximity to each other. It was temptation greater than almost any I'd ever known and so it was with grim resolve I laid myself down in the empty confines of my cabin, determined to lock away all thoughts of the turian and find sleep.

Surprisingly, it only took me an hour or two to do just that.

It was Joker's voice that woke me. A glimpse at the bedside hologram clock informed me that I'd slept longer than I had in a very long time. As I replied to Joker's hail in a hoarse, lethargic voice, I realized that, once again, I'd had no dream. It was a good omen, I decided, rolling over and sitting up as the Normandy's pilot relayed his message.

"It's the Illusive Man, Commander. He says it's urgent and wants to speak to you right away."

At the mention of my dangerously secretive benefactor, I scowled. I was still pissed at the steadily accumulating pile of omissions that he had kept from me in every mission I'd undertaken since agreeing to work with Cerberus. Slipping on my uniform, I then made my way to the CIC, skirting through the armoury to enter the debriefing room.

Upon stepping down into the holographic matrix that would relay my image to the Illusive Man, I inwardly resolved to get the answers I needed from him, as well as to take a hardline approach when I confronted him with all he'd kept from me. I was never given the chance, however, for immediately upon establishing a connection, he delivered news so important that it trumped the grudge I'd been nursing. A Collector vessel had encountered by a turian patrol which had somehow managed to subdue it; the Illusive Man had intercepted the turian transmissions from said battle.

"A Collector ship, Shepard," said the Cerberus leader, taking a long drag from his cigarette, his artificial eyes piercing even across the light-years that separated us. "We can't waste this opportunity."

As much as I hated to, I agreed with him. But I still wasn't sold; having witnessed first hand what the a Collector warship could do—and having died in the process—I was more than sceptical that the turians had come out on top in the supposed altercation. I said as much to the Illusive Man.

"I can't explain it and our window of opportunity is too small to try and learn more right now. Whatever is on that ship could be of great use to us."

"What about the turians?"

"According to their transmissions, they've pulled back. They sustained heavy damages and didn't want to linger in case the Collectors come by to salvage. Which," he added, "is why I recommend you and your crew get there, _fast_."

It didn't feel right. But then again, most of the assignments and suggestions he'd given me hadn't felt right, either. And as much as I hated it, he had a point. There may be something we could really use onboard that ship. After a short hesitation, I nodded my assent. He proceeded to transmit the relevant coordinates to the Normandy and bid me good luck. I didn't bother to reply.

"Joker," I said into my communicator as I made my way back through the armory. "Head for the coordinates he gave us. I want the entire team gathered in the debriefing room in one hour."

"You've got it, Commander," he replied. On the CIC I stood before the galaxy map, staring into its colorful, swirling depths and watching as the icon that represented the Normandy inched ever closer to the location of the Collector vessel.

"I've got a bad feeling," I said softly. This was a good opportunity, yes, but it was an incredibly dangerous one, as well. Apprehension swirled within me. It was a feeling I was by now familiar with, but one I couldn't abide. Hoping this weighty dread I felt was not in fact a premonition, I turned, stepped down and made my way to the elevator. In my cabin I would prepare for the sojourn onboard the Collector ship, deciding which hardsuit armor would give me the best advantage and choosing my arsenal for the mission.

An hour later I stood where I had such a short time before. This time, however, I was not alone. My team, such as it was, had gathered there as I'd ordered. My eyes found Garrus first, leaning against the wall in one corner, clad in his standard blue and black hardsuit. Samara and Jack stood side by side and I took a moment to reflect on the fact that two of the most powerful biotics I'd ever seen now occupied the same room. Grunt had taken up position next to the door, thick, powerful arms folded across his broad chest. Mordin stood opposite Samara, eyes blinking rapidly as they darted to each of us; Thane was beside him, hands clasped behind his back, looking completely at ease in his new surroundings.

The moment I'd entered the room, the moment I'd felt the combined weight of all their gazes, I'd hesitated. I didn't know all of them well. I didn't know if I'd come to like them when I did. But I was about to take them on a mission that could very well be suicidal and the ramifications of that were for a moment nearly staggering. I managed to shrug it aside—I couldn't afford to think of it, and taking a deep breath I addressed my team.

"The Illusive Man," I said slowly, "has found us a Collector ship, adrift."

**.x.**

I should have trusted my initial instincts. I didn't, of course—there was just too much in the way of opportunity awaiting us on the gargantuan ship floating helplessly in space. I think I knew all along—think we _all_ knew—that something was awry, for as the shuttle carrying my entire team entered the cavernous recesses of the vessel, we were all of us rendered silent by the daunting sight. After we'd disembarked, I quickly made two groups, one to venture further inside with me, the other to stay behind and guard the shuttle—our only way out—in case something nasty should appear. Jack, Miranda, Grunt and Jacob I chose to stay behind. It was risky, because of tensions that hovered ever-present between Jack and the two Cerberus agents, but I was fairly certain the powerful biotic was capable of stifling her hatred for the sake of the mission. Or at least I hoped she could.

Garrus, Mordin, Samara and Thane I chose to bring with me. Garrus' unerring sniper's eye I wanted with me, and to be honest I now trusted him more than any other to watch my back. Mordin I'd chosen because of his familiarity with the seeker swarms, and in case we came across some manner of new technology he might be able to adapt and use it to our advantage. Samara and Thane I had yet to see in any real action, or at least not the sort I was accustomed to, which was mostly comprised of overwhelming odds and enemies smarter and deadlier than your run-of-the-mill mercenaries. I wanted to know how they would measure up against their profiles the Illusive Man had provided me with and this was as good a time as any.

The interior of the ship was devoid of any kinds of life but we still moved through it with wary swiftness, our weapons ready to fire at any given moment. We kept conversation to a minimum; I'd ordered the guard team to maintain comm silence unless absolutely necessary. It was not long before we came across disturbing hints as to the reason behind the abductions of humans in the form of a pile of human body parts: arms, legs, pieces of torsos, heads. The stench was overwhelming, the sight horrifyingly gruesome. Mordin was the only one who was able to look at it for long and I suspected he was adept at compartmentalizing atrocities such as this—given the nature of his work with the krogan genophage, he'd have to be. As he ran his omni-tool over the heap of dismembered corpses, looking for any clue as to why such a thing had been done, the rest of us gravitated towards several of the strange pods we'd seen on Horizon.

"It's how they bring them onboard," Garrus said, gesturing with his rifle.

"They must have another purpose. It would be easier just to physically herd humans into the vessel, rather than parcelling every single individual into one of these." Thane, sliding his sub-machine gun into the holster at his back, knelt and ran one gloved hand over the side of the pod in a cursory examination.

"Perhaps," Samara offered, "they are some manner of stasis chamber?"

"Justicar is correct." Mordin said, having finished his analysis of the corpses As he approached us his fingers glided rapidly over the interface of his omni-tool. "Tissue remains show lingering effects of prolonged stasis. Propose most of abducted humans kept in pods while only a few are used for experimentation."

"What kind of experimentation?" I questioned, unable to keep my eyes from sliding back to the grotesque heap. I had managed not to think of it up until this point, but suddenly the confines of my breather helmet felt stifling, the way it did in my dream, the way it had when ... I took a deep breath, rolled my shoulders, and attempted to focus on what it was the doctor was saying.

"Initial scan shows evidence of genetic tampering. Not able to ascertain exact reason, need resources of Normandy's lab to reach more thorough conclusion."

There was nothing more we could do there, but it felt somehow wrong to me to move on so cavalierly. Humans had died here in terrible ways, subject to some manner of atrocious experimentation, and as I gazed again at the pile I found myself besieged by an awful, unavoidable thought—

"I wonder how many of them were from Horizon," I murmured, more to myself than anyone else.

Garrus heard me, of course. The other three had moved on ahead, but he turned to me, shaking his head. "Don't." I couldn't see his face because of the helmet he wore and I felt momentarily disconcerted by the emotionless visage he presented. This faded when transferred his rifle to one hand and touched me on the shoulder with the other.

"We can stop more of this from happening," he said, indicating the gory refuse with a tilt of his head. "So focus on that, Shepard."

He was right. I nodded my assent. He withdrew his hand, and together we quickly went forth to catch up with the others.

**.x**

Things went sideways not long after.

We'd found, with the aid of EDI, the central data-networking hub for the entire ship. I established with my omni-tool a bridge between EDI and the hub; as the Normandy's AI began the upload the entire vessel shuddered around us. What followed was sheer chaos: Joker's frantic shouting over the comm, intertwined with the steady monotone of EDI and the concerned barrage of questions from Miranda and during it all the five of us struggled to maintain our footing as the platform we stood upon rocked violently. The world suddenly steadied and the enormous confines of the chamber we were in fell silent. Knowing this to be the calm before the storm, I took advantage of it to make certain the Normandy and the rear guard team were okay. I'd just received confirmation on both accounts when Garrus shouted and pointed with his rifle. More platforms like the one we stood upon were inbound, and all of them carried Collectors.

We were outnumbered and we were on unfamiliar terrain, but we held our own. Garrus took up position on a platform that had taken up position adjacent, using a raised ledge for cover while he fired off successive headshots. Mordin knelt near him, peppering the Collectors with an effective mix of tech and bursts from his weapon. Samara, crouched behind the same short wall Thane had slid smoothly behind, made deadly use of both her assault rifle and her biotics, picking up enemies and throwing them into a deadly free fall with a simple wave of her arm. Thane was in continual motion, flowing from cover to cover and placing perfectly timed shots as he did so. His biotics, while not as potent as Samara's, were still enough to wreak havoc. I remained where I was, firing periodic bursts with my Locust in order to create a deadly crossfire with Garrus.

For a while, it looked like we might actually have an easy path by which to escape by. It wasn't to be, however—a warning cry from Samara jerked my head around to find four more platforms bearing Collectors soaring up from our right. I slid out from behind the ledge, intending to run for more suitable cover; the appearance of the new enemies had rendered my current position too vulnerable. Thane and Samara had done the same, vaulting up the terraced platforms in order to find safe spots near Garrus and Mordin. Switching my Locust to one hand, I used the other to vault upwards, my grip slipping momentarily on the smooth surface beneath me.

"Shepard, on your right! They've got heavies—"

Garrus's warning came too late. Still racing forwards, I took the full frontal brunt of a biotic shockwave released by one of the strange, fused abomination husks that stood on a platform that had just arrived. The impact knocked me flying; hitting the platform I'd just left behind, I skidded fast over the surface and came up hard against the ledge I'd been using for cover. Breathing was not an option in the moments that followed, as my insides seemed to have rearranged themselves under the force of the collision. As I gasped for air that wouldn't come, a new voice intruded upon the crazed clamor of the battle, low, booming and utterly imperious.

"_Assuming direct control."_

"Shepard, get up. Get up _now_."

I tried to obey Garrus' urgent command as swiftly as I could. Air had finally flooded my lungs; gasping I transitioned into a crouch, cradling the Locust I'd had the good fortune not to drop. I risked a glance over the ledge and found myself facing a form of the Collectors I'd never seen before. Its frame was identical to the others, but it glowed all over as though harboring an inner fire that was corroding it from the inside out.

"_Shepard_."

I knew the voice that emanated from this new and strange Collector, even though I'd never heard it before. I knew it was that of a Reaper, knew that the Reaper was directing every movement, every action this glowing creature before me was making. I knew also that it had done so in order to get at me, because it _knew_ me—

"We'll cover you while you move." Thane's rasped voice startled me out of my grim reverie, coming in loud and clear over the comm. I lurched upwards with the full intent to run, but hastily dropped back down again as the Collectors behind the Reaper-puppet opened up with a steady stream of suppressing fire. I heard over the din of multiple weapons being fired the distinctive echoing blast of Garrus' rifle and knew he was doing his best to thin the enemy ranks. I decided to try and assist, knowing I could never make it back to my team unless more of the Collectors were dropped. Trying to coordinate my fire with that of my team, I leaned out of cover and aimed for one out in the open. My shots punched their way up its torso and it flailed sideways before tumbling over the edge and into oblivion.

A piercing, airy whine cut through the commotion. Samara's voice, still calm, confirmed the arrival of more enemy-bearing platforms, this time to my left. The only place for me to go was up and back, but there was absolutely no way I'd make it there alive with so many flanking me. Hunching over to avoid being clipped by a stray shot as my team and the Collectors exchanged deadly streams of fire, I reached my free hand across and ripped from where it rode on my shield harness a flashbang grenade. I had no inkling if it would work as effectively on these creatures as it did on most others, but I was running out of options—I needed a distraction. I pulled the pin, leaned as far as I dared out of cover and hurled it into the midst of the Collectors on my right. The explosion created a white-hot burst that even from that distance had spots dancing in my eyes, but I blinked hard, leaned forward and braced my weight on my hands in preparation to burst forth and race up the haphazard staircase that had been created by the myriad platforms.

"Now, Shepard!"

I heeded Mordin's words and shot forwards. I knew I was going to take hits; my back was completely exposed and I prayed that my new armor's shield generators were up to the task. I leaped up the first step and vaulted over the second—with three more to go I was feeling pretty good about my chances. The faster I closed the distance between myself and my team, the better they'd be able to suppress anything that pursued.

"_This hurts you._"

I saw it out of the corner of my eye—a black and amber bolt of energy, similar to that a biotic would produce—hurtling in my direction. I veered, turning so sharply I had to catch myself with one hand on the ground. The mysterious projectile followed, perhaps locked on to the heat of my body, perhaps propelled by some technology the rest of the galaxy wasn't aware of yet. It hit me low on my left side with such force that I heard the telltale fizzle-snap of my shields dying, and I cried out as pain blossomed throughout my ribs, as I staggered uncontrollably to the side. The edge of the platform loomed all too near; I saw, as I struggled to regain my balance, Garrus vault over the low wall he'd been using for cover, assault rifle in hand as he prepared for a foolhardy rush in my direction.

There was no time. I couldn't straighten my body, doubled as it was by the hammering sensation that raced up and down my ribcage. I couldn't avoid the second bolt of energy—a product, I knew, of the Reaper-puppet—that honed in on me directly behind the first. The only way for me to go was up and I couldn't cover that distance in time. Still, I tried, lurching forward in an awkward limping run. The second projectile slammed into me with as much force as the first, and a red haze of agony descended over my vision, the world spiralling as I was driven over the edge of the platform.

A hand caught at my wrist just as the full realization of what had happened hit me; staring down into a void that may as well have been bottomless, listening to the frantic, frenzied voices over the comm I remained suspended there as the fingers holding me squeezed and flexed, attempting to maintain my weight. It was only when reality reasserted itself, that I could make out just what the voices in my ear were saying, that I tilted my head back to see just who it was that held me.

"Fall back." I said into the comm, my voice sounding foreign to me, flat and hollow as I stared up at the rippling, molten glow of the Reaper-controlled creature. For a moment we regarded each other, my eyes wide behind the clear surface of my helmet, its eyes multiple and filled with an eerie, malevolent light. It began to tug me upwards, counter-balancing against my pull.

The voices of Garrus, Mordin and Miranda had all been fiercely arguing against my directive. There was no chance of a rescue, not without loss of life. "Fall back to the shuttle," I said again, unable to tear my eyes from the Reaper-puppet. "All of you. Get back to the Normandy."

More hands—Collector hands—were reaching for me. A silence had fallen over the area—my team had stopped firing for fear of slaying my rescuer. Two of the creatures had joined their glowing comrade; one grasped me under my arm, the other catching at my other wrist. With a final, collective heave they pulled me over the side of the platform.

"Garrus." I said as calmly as I could as the Reaper-puppet, still crouching, placed its large, segmented hand upon my shoulder in order to keep my still. Flat on my back, I was surrounded by a loose circle of the Collectors and could see, from the very peripheral of my vision, more of them standing nearby, weapons drawn and pointed in the direction of my team. "Garrus, this is an order. Withdraw. Get back to the shuttle and return to the Normandy."

"Shepard—"

Everything I heard in his voice was echoed in the chaos of my mind, but I swallowed hard, still staring at my captors, and forced my words out past a jaw I had to unclench. "You're in charge now. You're Commander. Go."

There was no reply. "Go!" I shouted; my captors shifted at the noise, their own insect-like chitterings rising in response. And then their large, misshapen heads swivelled about in unison, and I knew then that Garrus was doing as I'd ordered. I felt no relief. I felt no hope. I felt nothing but a creeping, paralyzing fear as I realized I was as human as the bodies we'd found earlier, as I realized that this entire trap that had been laid—and there was no doubt now that it had been a trap—had been to lure me here and capture me.

The platforms that had assembled began to disperse, soaring back to wherever they'd come from. Combining with the noise they made came a deep and vibrating groan and I knew it for what it was—this ship was powering up. Even over all that commotion I could hear the distant echoes of gunfire and I closed my eyes, hoping Garrus and the rest would be able to make it back, hoping that the shuttle would be able to return to the Normandy before Collector's weapons came online.

I had no time for other, fervent silent prayers. The platform we all occupied was moving and as it did so, smoothly making its way, I was hauled roughly to my feet by two of the creatures. As we spiralled downwards I shifted my weight, testing their hold; immediately their grips tightened, and every single one of them gathered near looked my way as though anticipating my struggle. I bowed my head, breathed deep, and remained still for long moments, hoping they'd buy my air of defeat. Opening my eyes, I caught side of what looked like a docking bay growing steadily nearer. Whatever awaited me there, I didn't want to know.

I threw myself backwards, pulling my two handlers along with me. They kept me upright but I'd managed to knock them off balance; I surged in the other direction, breaking their hold and stumbling headlong into the crowd of the others. I had no weapon—my Locust had followed me over the side of the platform—so I made due with what I had. Hands balled into fists, I threw a punch directly into the eyes of the Collector that had caught me in the middle of my mad rush. The noise it made was a vibrating shriek that hurt my ears but I was moving away from it already, shoving through them all as they grabbed at me. I kicked at knee of one and it buckled, falling into another but already I was caught; hands caught my arms, caught my legs and I even felt fingers wrap about my neck and they bore me down, down until I was on my back again, held so securely I could hardly move.

"_Shepard_," came the very voice of enmity, "_You cannot resist_."

Inwardly, I planned to resist as much as I possibly could. The platform shuddered as though it had gently collided with something before falling still and I knew we'd arrived at our destination. I was lifted again to my feet and half-carried, half dragged forwards. I fought them every step of the way, kicking at their legs, pulling at their hold. I broke free several times only to be swarmed and subdued by their sheer numbers. They did not strike me and I found myself worried, ironically, by the fact that they would not cause me harm.

Thus continued our inexorable march.

My fate, when I finally saw it, threw me into a panicked frenzy. I twisted free of the two that held me and rushed at the others, plowing through them in a charge that would have made a krogan proud. Swiftly disentangling myself from those I'd knocked down, I deliberately stomped on the head of one and felt a savage satisfaction in the resulting squishing sound that mixed with its pained shriek. I swung about, looking for an escape only to stagger back several steps as the glowing Reaper-puppet rose up before me. It extended one hand, palm out, and pushed. The wave of energy it summoned broke over me in a debilitating wave and I knew then only a sensation of falling.

When awareness flooded back to me, I had been lifted by the arms and was being carried towards the dark, open maw of one of the stasis pods I had seen earlier. My head was bare; they had taken my helmet from me and I reached the sluggish conclusion that I could breathe the ship's atmosphere. My legs were dragging behind and I tried to get them beneath me but my body would not obey my commands; whatever the possessed Collector had done to me had been as potent as a heavy electrical shock. Upon reaching the pod they lifted me, turning me over so that I found myself staring up at a huge, domed ceiling that was littered with thousands of similar pods. I was chillingly certain that all of them contained fellow humans. I tried with silent and frantic fury to fight back, to free myself but it was as though my muscles and bones had been liquified. I could do nothing, say nothing, as they laid me carefully within the pod. The Reaper-puppet stepped near and with one long finger touched the interface that had sprung up the moment I'd touched the interior of the pod.

A pane of some clear material slid up and over me, effectively sealing me in. I was given no time to dwell on this new horror, however, for immediately the pod began to fill with some manner of liquid. It rose swiftly, swirling viscously about my legs and then my arms and then I could feel it at my neck, rising over the line of my jaw, filling my nose, oozing over my eyes as I squeezed them tightly shut.

And then I was enveloped.

**.x.**


	9. Guardian Servos

**.9.**

**-Guardian Servos-**

**.x.**

This was no merciful oblivion. I was still entirely aware, but unable to move any part of my body. I could feel nothing, either—the thick fluid that had flooded the interior of the pod had me suspended in the exact centre so that I had no contact with the solid walls around me. Though the liquid had invaded my nostrils and my mouth, I wasn't suffocating—but I wasn't breathing, either. I was in stasis, my body and all its internal workings paralyzed, but my mind remained free to recoil in horror at the realization that I was captured in this split-second freeze-frame for what could very well be a fathomless amount of time.

My eyes were still closed, as they had been the moment the liquid had engulfed me completely and for that small fact I was grateful, certain that if they'd remained open I would be staring out at a reality I was being denied. There was no sound, either, only a suffocating silence that served all too well to remind me of the splintered moments I'd known just before I'd died. This sensory deprivation was maddening; still free to think, my mind roamed frantically down innumerable paths and all of them lead to the same place. The Collectors would either kill me, use me for some manner of inexplicably atrocious experimentation, or leave me in the pod indefinitely.

Outwardly immobile, inwardly awash in a great and hopeless panic, I slowly began to prefer the first possibility over the others.

Without stimuli, without any awareness other than that of my spiralling thoughts, time lost all meaning. I could have been within the pod for just minutes or an eternity. I had no way of knowing. I began to realize with cold clarity that being sealed in here, being locked in stasis the way I was, could very possibly drive me mad. I needed contact of some kind, needed to be able to simply feel or hear or taste—I need something other than this terrible silence. I needed command over my body and not just my mind.

I mentally wearied myself, many times, by flying into an internal panic. Eventually my inner voices would fade and I would slumber—if that's indeed what it was—until the stunted awareness I was now limited to would return, and then the frenzied dread would begin all over again. How many times this rise and fall was repeated, I did not know. I lost count. And with that realization sank home the thought that perhaps I'd been sealed in the pod for years already, and that all those I'd known and cared for

_ —Garrus—_

were long dead and gone.

Within the steadily shrinking boundaries of my mind, I silently howled my desperation and terror to anything that might be listening. I prayed with all the fervency within my fettered soul, pleading for release. No answer came. I became lost in the nightmarish cycle of rage and despair and exhausted darkness. I came face to face in one moment, lost among others that I could no longer track or measure, with the dire eventuality that fate had cursed me with.

I would either die, or go insane.

**.x.**

Freedom, when it came, was a stark and rude happening.

I was relinquished from stasis the moment the seal on the pod ruptured. The fluid that had cradled me drained swiftly away and I felt my body slump and slide against the corded interior. As the liquid poured from my nostrils and open mouth I inhaled sharply, only to promptly choke on the remnants of the alien substance still coating my throat. Gasping for breath, my eyes snapped open but a thick, pinkish film still clung to my lashes, blinding me. I felt the pod tilt, or maybe it was just my equilibrium establishing itself; I tried to organize my limbs in order to catch myself but they flailed, my muscle coordination misfiring. I tumbled from the pod to land in an ungainly, panting heap.

The first clear breaths I drew I savored as they brought some clarity to my muddled state of mind. I didn't try to move for a long time, instead lying on the hard surface, taking a child-like delight in the sensations my skin, so long denied any kind of touch, was relaying to me. The ground was cold, rough, solid and I flexed the fingers of one gloved hand—I was still in my hardsuit armor—and shuddered as I felt the grooves slide beneath my fingers. Sounds had filtered back to me as well; the dull roar I eventually interpreted as the hum of a ship and I struggled for a moment to comprehend why that noise filled me with fear. The answer slipped away as a fickle ghost might and so I focused simply on the bombardments to my senses.

After several seconds of trying, I managed to get other hand to do as I wanted, and it slowly crawled upwards to wipe in a clumsy, uncoordinated motion at the clingy residue obscuring my vision. Blinking hard, I willed the kaleidoscopic blur of colors to gain shape and substance; eventually, they did. I stared out across a vast, open space, shades of brown upon amber upon black. There was something hauntingly familiar about the architecture. It reminded me of something insectoid, of an ancient malevolence. I closed my eyes tightly, knowing I needed to hone in on this fragmented slip of recollection and make it whole once again.

I was Shepard. Commander Amory Shepard. I had formerly belonged to the Systems Alliance N7 Special Forces. I'd died. I'd been remade. And my rebirth had happened for a reason—

_Collectors. Reapers._

_ —_and this was a Collector vessel. I'd been taken prisoner onboard this vessel, ordered the rest of my team to flee—

_My team. _

I sucked in another breath as memories battered me, one after the other in succession, with all the impact of a runaway krogan. I had no way of knowing how long I'd been in the pod, but I was free now ... but was this a rescue, or further punishment at the hands of my captors? Fearing what I'd see but needing to know, I marshaled my resolve and forced my still-uncooperative body into rolling over, groaning softly with the effort.

It took me a moment to reconcile what I was seeing with the still cluttered memories I was negotiating through. When it finally clicked, I could do nothing but stare uncomprehendingly.

It wasn't a Collector. It wasn't a member of my team. What stood there, looking down at me with a painfully bright oculus, was a geth.

**.x.**

To say that I was confounded would have been an understatement of galactic proportions. My thoughts were still a hazy mess, polluted as they were by my time in stasis. I was positive—as much as I could be—that I was still onboard the Collector vessel. I couldn't conciliate the geth's presence here, nor why it would have freed me from the pod. In the lengthy seconds that followed, I fully expected it to open fire upon me much like any other geth I'd ever encountered had done. But I noticed its hands were empty of any weapon and it had yet to move. I was at a total loss as to what to do. I didn't yet have enough control over my limbs to facilitate either attack or escape; I was right then the proverbial sitting duck.

We observed each other for a long while, my gaze uncertain and a little fearful, its gaze from its oculus completely unwavering. Finally it moved, slowly dropping into a crouch a mere arms length from me.

"Shepard-Commander." It said.

I didn't think I could become even more flummoxed than I already was, but the fact the geth was speaking to me proved me very, very wrong on that account. Its voice was modulated, inherently mechanical and without inflection. I wondered wildly if that was what all geth sounded like; I had no basis of comparison to work with, as I hadn't even been aware geth could communicate in such ways. I stared at it a moment longer as I struggled to come to terms with this newest bit of strange reality.

I still half-expected the geth to strike, but it made no further moves in my direction. Its stillness was unnerving; it was absolutely motionless, no rhythmic expansion of its chest to breathe, no minute flexing of muscle. Its eye, such as it was, did not blink but instead remained trained on me, a steady and intimidating light.

"... why did you free me?" I finally asked, my voice little more than a croak from extended disuse.

The flaps above its ocular component quickly rose and fell in a way that made it seem bemused by my question. "You are Shepard. Commander. Alliance. Human. Fought heretics. Killed by Collectors. Recently discovered to still be alive."

I opened my mouth, hesitated, and closed it again. That was not what I had expected. I didn't really know what I _had_ expected, but hearing my name and an abbreviated list of my accomplishments cited by a geth had definitely not been it.

It was still speaking. "You oppose the Old Machines. You oppose the heretics that follow them. You killed their god. You succeeded where others did not. Your code is superior."

"I also died," I said, experimentally rising up on one elbow. As bizarre as it all was, I wasn't getting a sense of animosity from this geth. Of course, it was hard to get a sense of anything from geth. My instincts, after the initial shock, had grown quiet. I felt—I hoped—that this one in particular meant me no harm.

"Yes." Was all it said in reply to my statement.

"How did you know I was ... alive? Again, I mean?" I began coughing towards the end of my question; the words had caught in my throat, which had been rendered sensitive and raw by my inhalation of the fluid from the stasis pod. The geth waited until the spasms had abated before responding.

"We monitor organic transmissions. Some made reference to your return."

"So you've been looking for me? Is that how you came to be here?"

"Yes. We visited Normandy's wreckage on Alchera. You were not there. Once we heard organic transmissions claiming you were alive, we began to search again. We followed you to Freedom's Progress and Horizon. On Horizon, we encountered this vessel."

I had been studying it intently as it spoke, searching for some notable difference that would visually distinguish it from all the other geth I'd seen. This one seemed a little worse for wear; a gaping, ragged tear in the left side of its torso allowed me a look at its mechanical insides, labyrinthine knots of wires and hose that glowed a pulsating, eerie blue. My eyes travelled upwards, and it was then that I belatedly noticed its most obvious and standout feature—welded to its shoulder was a piece of N7 armor. I propped myself up on my other elbow to get a closer look. It was battered and faded, but it was undoubtedly N7 in design.

"That's my armor." I said in confused disbelief, indicating the gear in question with a thrust of my chin.

The flaps above its singular eye rose and hovered there a moment before swiftly descending. "Yes."

My arms had started to shake from the exertion of keeping myself semi-upright; with a grunt I collapsed onto my back once again, rubbing at my forehead with one hand. The swift procession of events that had just transpired—being freed from the pod and then experiencing the subsequent side effects of prolonged stasis, as well as the shock of encountering my unexpected savior, had my head pounding. With my eyes closed, I was on the verge of asking it why it was wearing a piece of my old N7 gear, but it spoke before I could.

"Shepard-Commander. We cannot remain here. There are frequent Collector patrols in this area. We are not sufficiently armed or prepared to deal with an encounter at this time."

That unwelcome bit of news snapped my eyes open, and I experienced a sudden frission of fear There was absolutely no way I'd recovered enough to be able to walk on out of ... well, wherever it was that we currently were, and I told the geth as much.

"The muscular weakness was expected. It is the effect of stasis on organics. We will assist you."

The geth still spoke without emotion, but I was getting a clear sense of urgency from it. Gritting my teeth, I concentrated on making my reluctant body attain an upright, sitting position. Once I'd managed that much, the geth rose and approached, dropped to one knee beside me, and with an arm about my shoulders helped me to stand.

"Thanks," I said breathlessly, winded by even that small exertion. The geth said nothing, withdrawing its arm and taking a step back. Bereft of its support, I found myself tottering on legs that shook badly. I lost my balance and stumbled sideways; the geth caught me before I toppled over completely.

"Worse than I thought," I muttered, clinging to the humanoid machine at my side and finding myself unable to help feeling more than a little inadequate. "I don't think I can make it too far, not like this."

"We will assist you." The geth repeated.

We began to move. I was impressed; the geth was bearing most of my weight with its arm threaded under mine and splayed out across my back, and it was moving as effortlessly as it had before.

"How did you know I was here?" I asked as we moved quickly out of the area. A cursory glance had informed me it was a medium-sized chamber, empty but for what looked like some manner of medical bed and a large interfacing console set into the wall where my pod had been situated. I craned my head back and looked at the ceiling, seeing what I expected to see—rows upon rows of other pods. I had a leaden feeling in my gut that the geth had just rescued me from a Collector laboratory.

"We were on Horizon. We meant to interact with you there. However, it was our consensus to infiltrate this vessel in order to ascertain full extent of Collector technology."

"You've been on this ship since Horizon?"

"Yes."

"How—" I began to ask, breaking off as I stumbled. The steady grip of the geth kept me from falling, and after a moment I picked up where I'd left off. "How have you managed to remain undetected for so long?"

"Collector security protocols are not set to monitor geth frequencies." That made sense. The Collectors hunted the furthest reaches of the Terminus Systems for their prey and did not linger once they had struck. The Collectors and the geth were not enemies, but weren't allies either. A geth actually managing to get onboard one of Collector ships was thus an incredibly remote possibility. Still, being shielded from the scanners would be a useless boon should the geth be seen by actual Collector eyes. As though aware of my last thought, the one at my side added, "This platform is outfitted with a tactical cloaking system."

So it had been able to move throughout the maze-like corridors of this vessel like a literal ghost. The cloak would be of no use to it now, not while it was carrying me around. I was very aware that just because luck had thrown an ally my way didn't mean the road from here would be any easier. I was unarmed—all my weapons had been stripped from me in those last frenzied moments before my imprisonment within the pod—and I was hardly able to stand on my own. Any advantages the geth had would be of little use if it chose to stay and aid me until I regained my strength and control over my own body. We were two amidst thousands of hostiles—or perhaps even more than that—and we were strangers on unfamiliar ground. Well, I amended silently, flicking a sideways glance at my rescuer, it was unfamiliar to _me_.

With all these new worries dancing in my head, I opted to keep silent for the time being. It became easier to function the more we walked; my body was relearning the fundamentals it briefly forgotten. I still had to lean hard on the geth, but I took heart in how quickly stability was returning to me. I wondered if once it was discovered I was free an alarm would sound throughout the ship, but I discarded that thought—from what I'd seen, and from what Mordin had been able to glean from our scans, the Collectors were able to communicate in a manner that was similar to that of telepathy. When my absence was realized, we would be contending with a horde.

We wound through empty passages at a pace that, while not swift, was still impressive given my condition. The geth chose our path unerringly and I trusted it enough at this point to willingly follow. Not that I had much of a choice. We came to a halt unexpectedly; so lost had I been in my grim musings that it took me by surprise.

"I can keep going," I told my comrade, though truthfully I had become winded by the exertions of trying to make my limbs function normally.

"It is not necessary to go any further, Shepard-Commander."

I looked around. We'd entered a large room that appeared to be a dead end; save for the tunnel we'd entered from, the only other exit was effectively barred by a massive metal door. The floor here rose and fell in uneven mounds, reminding me again of some manner of insect hive. This location didn't strike me as the best place to make a stand, and I was positive that taking a stand was going to be an unfortunate inevitability. I vocalized my concern.

"This location is not intended for use for defensive or strategic advantages. Analysis of this vessel's engine propulsion output and current trajectory indicates Collectors intend to assault another human colony."

I let my hands fall from where they'd gripped the geth's shoulder and took an unsteady, experimental step away. I felt far more stable than I had, and I managed to walk the short distance to one of the mounds rising from the floor. I eased myself down onto it and turned to face the geth, propping my elbows on my knees and clasping my hands together.

"That's how we're getting out of here, isn't it?" I asked.

"Yes."

"There's no way we'll be able to slip out unnoticed."

"Your observation is correct. Some confrontation will be inevitable."

"How long until we're there? Do you know? Actually, don't answer that," I interrupted as it began to answer my questions. The two flaps above its ocular component rose and fell in rapid counterpart to each other, giving it a mildly frustrated expression. "I have enough to worry about as it is," I explained, unclasping my hands and spreading them wide. "Anyways, I'm feeling better. A couple hours and I'll almost back to normal." _ I hope_, I added silently.

The geth remained silent. I was perturbed, but decided I needed to work past it—the creature before me was the only hope I had of getting out of here. I decided to continue getting answers, as it seemed we would be here for a while.

"Why aren't they looking for me yet?"

"The Collectors are not yet aware you are missing. Prior to your release they engaged in large-scale preparations for their next attack."

"Still ..." I contemplated what the geth had said and frowned. "I find it hard to believe they'd go to such lengths to capture me only to forget I existed."

"They did not forget, Shepard-Commander. They do no function as humans do. They do not function as geth do. They have no concept of infiltration. They do not know we are here, or what we have done."

"Secure in their defenses," I murmured. This too made sense—so formidable a foe were the Collectors that they would not expect what had just happened: a geth stealing aboard to subsequently free me.

"Do you know how long I've been here? How long I was in ..."

It wasn't necessary for me to end that inquiry. "Yes. By human reckoning, this is the fourteenth day of your imprisonment."

I reeled a bit at that. My time in stasis had felt much longer, but I was still astonished and disheartened to learn I'd been trapped for such a significant amount of time. "And the Normandy ... do you know if it managed to get away?"

"We were able to monitor your transmissions and that of your team once you came aboard, Shepard-Commander. After you were placed in stasis, those transmissions indicated your subordinates were able to escape, as you had ordered them to do."

I breathed a heavy sigh of relief. That was one huge weight off my mind. "How many of you," I demanded abruptly, "am I speaking to now?"

Its ocular flaps fluctuated slightly. "This mobile platform houses one-thousand-one-hundred-eighty-three programs."

"What do I call you?"

The oculus rotated to one side and then another, flaps descending, giving it a somewhat perplexed air. It was starting to bother me that I kept interpreting these simple mechanical workings as forms of expression. "We are geth." It finally said.

I sighed; I'd expected that answer. "It'll do for now. Later—" I stopped mid-sentence. Talking about the future I aspired to, mainly one involving my return to the Normandy and my crew, seemed like bad luck at such a desperately tenuous time.

I had so many other questions. This geth contained a wellspring of information that the population of the entire galaxy could benefit from. But I remained silent, considering all that had just been relayed to me. Time enough later to seek information.

_If _we survived.

A silence that was not quite companionable fell between us. The geth remained standing where I'd left it, its single eye trained on me. I grew uncomfortable under the directness of its gaze and became concerned that it would remain staring at me for the duration of the wait before us. Eventually, when it became apparent I had nothing else to ask, it half-turned to face the massive metal door set in the wall opposite. I slid down until I rested on the ground with the solid surface of the mound at my back. Even in the few minutes that had passed since our flight from my pod had ceased, I had continued to feel more and more like myself. I leaned my head back and stared at the warped and grooved surface above me, thankfully devoid of the pods that decorated the rest of the ship. Given all that just transpired, it really wasn't all that surprising that in spite of the current circumstances, I managed to drift off to sleep.

**.x.**

"Shepard-Commander."

I came awake with a jolt to find the geth looming before me. From this angle, I thought somewhat blearily, blinking to cut through the remaining haze of slumber, it looked very imposing. I rose to my feet with considerably more ease than I had previously. I rotated my neck and wind-milled my arms before walking a line away from the geth and then back again, pleased to find my limbs were now responding the way they were supposed to. Internally and reluctantly I ceded that maybe I needed to give Cerberus more credit than I already had, for whatever they'd done to me had some serious perks in the healing and recovery department.

"We've arrived?" I asked my comrade.

"Yes."

"This is an airlock hatch?" I asked, gesturing to the door.

"Yes."

I sucked my lower lip in between my teeth as I considered the area, the mounds we could use for cover, trying to find the exact spot where maybe, with any luck, we could force the Collectors into a bottleneck. I blew my breath out a moment later and turned to find the geth had removed from where it rode at its back a weapon and was holding it out to me.

I took it carefully, measuring its weight as I hefted it, testing its balance as it extended into its full length. It was a sniper rifle, one I recognized: an M-98 Widow. It was extremely powerful and extremely accurate. It was also never designed or meant to be wielded by a human.

Again, the geth spoke as though anticipating my thoughts. "You now possess a vast array of cybernetic implants, Shepard-Commander. Thorough scans have indicated that you are capable of wielding the weapon without coming to injury."

I crooked a brow; when had it done thorough scans of my anatomy? But that too was another question for another time. Resolutely, I shouldered the rifle and picked my way through the mounds on the floor until I found one that was taller than the rest. I sank to one knee, laid the barrel of the Widow upon the mound, and brought my eye to the scope. Instantly my vision zoomed in upon the geth; I could see the individual, tiny pitted scars that littered the surface of the N7 armor—_my_ armor—it wore. I lifted my head and shifted my weight, moving the rifle until it felt comfortable against my shoulder. I glanced up at the geth and found it regarding me again, an implacable machine who'd gone from enemy to savior. I was still reeling a little from that unexpected transition.

"Are you sufficiently prepared?" It asked me.

I laughed, a mirthless exhale of air. "Not even a little," I replied, shrugging. "But it'll have to do."

**.x.**

_Systems, take me home and disassemble me_

_Will I be terminated with you near?_

_Alongside the others that I hold so close._

_If I'm to be killed, then when? By who?_

_[IRO-bot – Coheed & Cambria]_


	10. To Those Left Behind

**.10.**

**-To Those Left Behind-**

**.x.**

_Sir, I think you'd better take my hand_

_and pray we'll make this one out alive._

_Captain! We've lost all systems control!_

_[Junesong Provision – Coheed & Cambria]_

**.x.**

The world as it was shuddered around us when the Collector vessel landed. The geth explained to me in the tense minutes that followed the situation the way it was going to down: we were situated near one of many airlock hatches. We wouldn't be dealing with the majority of the Collector crew, but we would be dealing with some of their number, nonetheless. The hatch would only open in proximity of a Collector. We had to wait until it was open and they were through before we could attack. Which meant that I had to hide myself somehow, in order for our ambush to work. After that, we then had to move with all haste into the colony proper and find a safe location whereupon we would go to ground, wait until the Collectors completed their task, and then contact the Normandy.

Provided we survived. Provided we could get the colony's communications working again. Provided the Normandy was still in one piece ...

We heard sounds not long after of the Collectors drawing near. The geth activated its cloak and rippled out of view. I climbed over one of the mound-like ridges closest to the chamber wall. It formed an L-shape. With any luck, once I hunched over into a ball in an effort to make myself as small as possible, I would go unnoticed; it was unfortunate, I mused darkly as the approaching footsteps of the Collectors became audible throughout the large recesses of the chamber, that I had never really been a believer in good fortune. I was huddled in as compact a form as I could manage, clutching the rifle across my abdomen and fighting the near-overwhelming urge to pop my head up to get an accurate head-count. If a Collector happened to simply stray in my direction, all it had to do was glance down and I'd be discovered. I tried not to think about that as I waited, afraid to breathe, for the sound of the hatch being opened.

Garbled noises reached my ears, the strange, inhuman voices of the Collectors. They sounded as if they were directly before my makeshift shelter and I closed my eyes in anticipatory dread; then they were past, moving towards the hatch, and I let my breath out in a slow, inaudible hiss. Lengthy seconds ticked by and then I heard the telltale rumble of the airlock opening. I moved quickly, unfurling myself, steadying the rifle and aligning my eye to the telescopic sight. I shifted to my right, the long barrel of the Widow sliding left until the misshapen head of a Collector filled the cross-hairs. It was at the end of a procession exiting through the hatch; I couldn't see how many preceded it but I hoped it was only a few.

As the Collector centered in my scope was on the verge of crossing the threshold, I fired. The noise was deafening, a thunderous, hollow boom that seemed to reverberate off every surface in the huge chamber. Though I'd been expecting it, the rifle's kick was tremendous, rocking me backwards and very nearly knocking me down flat; I would be sporting a new, large and colorful bruise as a souvenir later. The Collector dropped instantly, gore spattering the walls and the ground. Smothering my involuntary cry of victory, I repositioned myself, keeping my eye glued to the Widow's scope while I waited for the chaos to start. I wasn't kept in suspense for long. A Collector reappeared from outside the ship, hastily approaching its fallen comrade. Through the scope I saw multiple amber eyes and I fired again, wincing from the pain even as I revelled in the grim satisfaction I felt as the creature toppled over on top of the first.

The Collectors that had previously exited began re-entering in earnest. I felled another before they pinpointed the direction my shots were coming from. They dispersed swiftly, lunging for cover while opening up on me with their own weapons. I dropped and twisted so the mound was solid at my back, sidling over so that I could slide out to break cover and fire. Any advantages I'd had were gone now and there was no way I'd be able to steal enough time to line up another precision shot, but I still had to keep them distracted so that the geth could go to work.

Unless of course it had decided not to. It was a geth, after all.

I decided not to think about that, instead popping my head out of cover only long enough to secure a head-count. There were six of them. I saw that number fall by one as the geth rematerialized behind the Collector situated farthest from me and fired point blank into its head with its assault rifle. The other creatures ceased their fire, swivelling as one to face this new threat, but the geth had already re-engaged its cloak. I took advantage of their momentary confusion, quickly sighting the rifle and dispatching another lethal round.

Four were left. I was forced back into cover as the Collector nearest me resumed its attack. I noticed their fire was erratic, more as though they wanted to wound me than kill me. After a moment's reflection, I realized that was most likely their goal. After all, they'd gone to great lengths to ensnare me earlier ...

A vibrating shriek informed me that my geth partner had eradicated another Collector. I heard a flurried burst of fire from our enemies, followed by a garbled mechanical noise that made me wince. Following a hunch, I slid out of cover once more. The geth was in plain view, keeping up a stream of suppressing fire while smoothly backing around the maze of mounds in order to keep two encroaching Collectors at bay. A quick glance around informed me that all other Collectors had been eradicated—I felt a fleeting surge of admiration for my partner's skill—and so I rose up, firmly planted my feet wide apart and sighted the Widow. The Collectors and the geth danced in and out of my scope as they continued their chase. I held my breath, finger trembling over the trigger until I saw my shot; I pulled it hard and promptly stumbled backwards into the chamber wall, driven by the force of the Widow's recoil. I shoved myself up and away as swiftly as I could, running ahead to get a clearer view of the situation.

The geth was the only one standing. It fired once, twice, into the Collector corpse at its feet before it began to move, weaving its way back to me.

"That all of them?" I asked as it neared, shifting the rifle to one hand and rotating my bruised shoulder experimentally.

"Yes."

I brought up the Widow's interface, fingers moving swiftly over the hologram in order to check. how many rounds were left. I'd be okay for a while, providing we could steer clear of any huge skirmishes. I shouldered the rifle and eyed my geth companion with a new modicum of respect because it hadn't abandoned me and because it had dispatched more Collectors than I had, and with considerably more ease. Its body seemed none the worse for wear to my untrained eye, and I had the unnerving feeling that it was checking me over for injuries, as well.

It said, "We must move quickly before the Collectors are able to fully infiltrate the colony."

One obstacle down, many more to go. I sighed heavily. "After you," I said, gesturing to the open hatch.

**.x.**

Outside, it was Horizon all over again.

The resolution I'd made earlier, the one that common-sense had dictated I adhere to, faltered almost immediately upon exiting the Collector vessel. For there were human colonists all around, trapped in a terrible still life of fear and panic; the Seeker swarms had already been released. I passed woman curled in the fetal position, an older man crouching with hands raised to shield his eyes, a mother kneeling protectively over her small child—

I stopped running, staring down at the imprisoned pair, feeling a helplessness so great and horrible that I could feel it catching in my throat. If I kept on going they would be subjected to the same nightmare I'd endured and it would undoubtedly end much worse—what if they were chosen for the experiments? I dropped to one knee, tugging with one hand at the mother's shoulder. It was as though I touched stone, rigid and unrelenting. I tried to pry her away from her child, a little boy who was in a half-seated, half-supine position, his wide, fearful eyes trained unwaveringly upon his mother's face. I couldn't budge either of them, but I kept trying, driven by a panicked urge, so focused that I forgot for a moment the geth standing beside me.

"Shepard-Commander," it said, and its voice was definitely pressing, "We must go."

I ignored it. I rose to move behind the woman and wrap my arms around her torso. Bracing myself, digging my heels into the grassy earth, I sucked in a breath and pulled hard. It was of no use; by whatever biological mechanism the Seeker swarms had used to induce this stasis, it was as if the woman was anchored solidly to the ground. I stepped back, agitatedly brushing stray strands of hair out of my face as I tried to think of something—_anything_ I could do ...

"Shepard-Com—"

"Shut up." I snapped. I was all too aware of how precarious a position we were in, but this child and his mother ... I had to _try_. I didn't hope to be able to explain that to the geth in terms it could comprehend. Circling the woman I moved to kneel by the child, reaching down and gripping him gently under the arms before I began to haul backwards. The result was the same. I couldn't tug the child free of whatever inexplicable fetters held him. Breathing hard I got to my feet and paced a tight, frustrated circle around the couple.

The geth stopped me in my tracks, catching me by the upper arm as I stalked past. I whipped my head around to glare at it, knowing it couldn't understand this desperate urgency I was feeling, knowing it was right in its logic that we had to leave this mother and child behind.

"We must continue." It repeated.

It took me three tries to wrench free of its three-fingered grip and when I finally succeeded I staggered back two steps before catching myself. I spun around to face the pair frozen in a macabre embrace on the ground and grabbed at my head with both hands as I wrestled with simultaneous despair, rage and fear on behalf of all the humans in this doomed colony. My throat was tight with emotion and my eyes had begun to burn in that manner that warned tears were imminent; my lips thinned as I blinked hard and swallowed. Composed—or at least as close to composure as I was going to get—I swivelled back around to the geth and wordlessly indicated with one hand for it to continue on.

As I passed the rigidified mother, I laid a hand upon her shoulder, hoping that somehow she might know the strength of my sorrow and remorse.

**.x.**

We found temporary refuge from the Collector teams sweeping through the colony in a small warehouse near the center of the colony. The door had been left open and there were no colonists in the immediate vicinity, which I hoped would cause the Collectors to pass the area over without a thorough search. Though we hadn't yet encountered our adversaries, it would only be a matter of time if we stayed out in the open. I entered the warehouse first, taking two cautious steps inside with the Widow cradled in my grasp. A quick, cursory glance revealed the interior was empty save for stacks of crates and a row of lockers against one wall. Half-turning, I beckoned the geth inside.

Once we were both within, I turned to the door interface and proceeded to work on bypassing the circuits that would allow someone to open it from the outside. It only took a few minutes, and I stepped back satisfied as the holographic indicator in the center of the door turned from green to red. Should the Collectors decide to search this building, they would be undeterred by the lock and would simply cut through the door, but at least we'd have warning enough to escape out the door I'd seen in the opposite wall. I turned to look at the other exit; its indicator was also red, but I knew that I could unlock it quickly.

Now sequestered somewhat safely within, I was unable to keep my thoughts from returning to the fate of all the humans we'd passed on our mad dash through the sprawling layout of the colony—especially that of the mother and child, and with a sigh I leaned back tiredly against the door.

The geth was walking the perimeter of the small warehouse. It was dark within, lit only by a few rays of sun that filtered in through the slats in the roof, but I could see the beam of the geth's eye moving like a spotlight over the crates, the floor, the walls, the lockers. Examining it now, I suddenly found it hard to regard it as anything other than male, so similar was its frame and build to that of a male quarian. Made in the likeness of its Creators, I realized, and felt foolish for not recognizing that fact much, much sooner.

"When we—_if_ we are able to get back to the Normandy, what then? For you, I mean?" Though I'd pitched my voice low, it still seemed abrasively loud in the stifled stillness of the warehouse.

The geth, having completed his walkthrough, turned to face me. The flaps framing his oculus moved in unison as he answered. "We came from beyond the Perseus Veil to find you, Shepard-Commander."

The geth had a habit of answering my questions with statements that were decidedly evasive. I already had an inkling as to the real answer, and so I said, "You want to join my team, then?"

He dipped his head. "Yes."

I was quiet for a time, considering this and the complications that would arise should I agree. Integrating him into the team I'd assembled would be no easy feat, given the prejudices against his kind that ran rampant—prejudices that I myself had only recently been forced to reconcile. "The others under my command won't agree with it."

"We do not intend to cause harm to you or any of your crew. That is not our purpose."

"Just what exactly is your purpose?"

"To observe. To assist you and those with you in your endeavours against the Old Gods and the heretics aligned with them."

"Observe what?"

The flaps above his ocular component flared upwards and remained there for long seconds before falling again. "Organics."

That was an answer that covered a very, very broad spectrum, but I knew it was the only answer I would get. Regardless, I was curious to know what exactly about organics he wished to observe and why, and inwardly resolved to ferret out the full answer at later time.

There was no sound from without other than the continuous deep hum of the Collector vessel. I pushed away from the door and began walking my own circuit through our new surroundings, halting to search through the lockers bolted to the far wall. They contained little more than work coveralls, boots and gloves and other random articles of clothing, but in the last I found a weapon. Lifting it, I recognized it immediately—a M-6 Carnifex Hand Cannon, a type of heavy pistol. It wasn't my preferred weapon, but it would be far easier to use in confined spaces than the Widow. After checking to see if it was loaded, I added it to my arsenal.

"Here." I said to the geth, approaching him and holding out the Widow. His oculus moved from the weapon to me. "I found another gun," I explained, gesturing a thumb over my shoulder to the lockers behind me. "And if the Collectors manage to find us, this won't be of much use on the run anyways."

Without a word, he took the rifle back from me, collapsing it and returning it to its place at his back. I stepped past him and resumed my circular path through the warehouse. There was nothing else to do, and I refused to sit and pass the time by thinking of all the things I could be doing outside these walls, all of which consisted of trying to save the ensnared colonists.

I'd just began my sixth revolution when we heard noise at the door.

**.x.**

Our escape from the warehouse was narrow, but it was an escape. From there we raced deeper into the colony with me in the lead because I was somewhat familiar with the layout of human colonies. I made our path as complex as I could, charging through buildings left open, doubling back when I deemed safe. Several times we came upon Collectors, but managed to avoid detection and diverted in another direction. By the time the colony's communications dish rose into clear view before us, my nerves were frayed raw from apprehension. The dish was attached to a huge latticed steel structure anchored to a large, rectangular building. As we ran up the gentle incline towards it I wheeled around to see if our tail was still clear. Seeing it was, I spun back around and strove to catch up with the geth.

The door to the communications building was locked, and as I worked hurriedly at the interface in order to override the security, the geth stood guard with his assault rifle held in firing position. I connected the last two circuits and the door slid open; tapping the geth on the shoulder I crossed the threshold and he followed close behind. The door boomed shut behind us, and we found ourselves standing within a long room with a series consoles set into one in one wall and a row of large windows embedded in the other. All the console screens were flashing amber, indicating that something was wrong with the communications array. As the geth moved deeper into the room, I turned back to the door and began another bypass, setting it so that it could only be opened from our side.

When I'd finished that, I moved to stand beside the geth before the large windows. The building we occupied was set upon a hill and our view overlooked the rest of the colony. I was startled to see how close the Collector ship was, and wondered if that fact meant that this area had already been searched. I could see some of the Collectors moving through the scattered buildings and watched as they approached the humans caught in stasis, watched as something they did freed the colonists from their unseen bonds and rendered them moveable enough to place inside the pods. And as those pods were taken back on board the gigantic vessel that rose like a horrific mountain before us, I turned away, unable to watch any more.

I couldn't help these poor people, I knew that. If I went out there now and tried, I would most assuredly be either gunned down or taken captive again. I needed to stay alive and remain free in order to continue my mission to stop this from happening to others But it wasn't others that filled my mind with self-loathing and guilt. It was the faces of the mother and her son that I'd left behind, who were now undoubtedly contained in pods within the Collector vessel. With one hand I rubbed at the space between my brows and the pain building there, stepping away from the geth and the terrible scene unfolding outside.

Once again, there was nothing for us to do but wait. Once the ship departed we would work at trying to establish communications with the Normandy, but until then we were left with a lot of time to kill. Refusing to look back out the window, I crossed the room and sank down cross-legged, resting my head against the wall as the pain burgeoned into a throbbing ache. I closed my eyes, seeking only a brief moment of rest, but as I'd known it would, the image of the woman and her child refused to leave me.

**.x.**

Dawn the next day on the planet called Yanna Opar brought with it rescue in the form of the Normandy's shuttle.

Our haven hadn't been discovered, and after the Collectors departed it took the geth only a short time to get the communications back up and running. The Normandy responded after my first transmission, and Joker's exuberant voice within the earpiece nearly deafened me. It would take them hours to reach our position, he told me, but they would be there without fail. By then night had fallen over the colony, or New Malta, as we'd discovered it was named. The geth, perhaps sensing the encroach of my exhaustion, proposed I try to rest while he stood watch. I agreed, but was unsurprisingly unable to sleep for any longer than short periods at a time.

Now I stood at the door of the comm station, watching as the shuttle descended swiftly and aligned itself into a landing position at the base of the small incline. The geth remained in the building as I'd requested, knowing that even if he stood at my side with his arm around me and mine around him some members of my team would still be inclined to shoot first and be reprimanded later.

"I'll go out first." I said as the shuttle settled upon the ground, its engines dying away. "I need to explain the situation. I'll return for you once it's all settled."

"Understood, Shepard-Commander."

I stepped out of the building and began making my way down the hill. The shuttle's hatch opened and Mordin hopped out, to be immediately followed by Garrus, Jacob, Grunt, Thane and Samara. At the sight of the turian, my heart skittered through its next beats and the relief I felt then was so strong it felt as though I may smother under its weight. The six of them caught sight of me immediately and began swiftly heading in my direction, and I quickened my own pace in response.

"Shepard!" This from Garrus, who was the first to reach me; he slowed to a halt as he neared. There was so many things I wanted to say to him right then, so many things I wanted to do, but I was hampered by the presence of the others. As I approached, I realized that the difficult decision was one I'd already made at some point during the chaotic span of time we'd been separated.

"Garrus." I said, my fast and determined strides bringing me right up in front of him. The others had reached us and fanned out around the turian, but I had eyes only for him though I was aware of their excited voices, of their hands touching me in a celebratory, disbelieving manner. _ Fuck it_, I thought, and reaching out, grabbed Garrus by the solid cowl of his hardsuit. His expression as I jerked him down to my level was one of mingled astonishment and concern, his eyes wide with alarm. Rising up on the balls of my feet, I kissed him hard on the thin, straight line of his mouth.

The silence that fell was nearly thunderous in its intensity. As I took a step back, I found myself smiling, a wide grin that surprised me because it was actually authentic. I was alive, and so were they—we still stood a chance against all the shit the universe was throwing our way and maybe, just maybe we could save the people that had vanished from this colony ...

It was Mordin that broke the silence first, stepping up to scan me with his omni-tool. "Am seeing no substantial injuries. Considerable bruising of the infraspinatus muscle, but nothing that won't heal. Still, recommend you report to medical lab on Normandy once we're aboard for more thorough examination." Having finished his scan, he looked at me and nodded. "Glad to see you're okay, Commander."

I clapped him on the shoulder. "You too, Mordin." From there my eyes moved over the others assembled. Jacob was regarding me with a mildly perturbed expression. Samara's face was calm and composed as it always seemed to be, and from Thane of course there was no indication of how he felt about my greeting to Garrus. Grunt's eyes were narrowed speculatively, his arms crossed over his barrel chest, and Garrus ...

He looked absolutely flustered, though I saw a smile flitting about the corners of his mouth, and I felt my grin grow wider in response. Rather than address what had just happened, however, I turned from him and spoke to the group as a whole.

"Before I tell you about what happened—before we return to the Normandy—there's something I need to explain to you. I had some help in escaping. In fact, he's the only reason I'm here right now, and I've decided he's coming with us."

"Another human?" Jacob asked me, shifting to scan the area in order to pinpoint who it was I was speaking about.

"No." I said, shaking my head, smile fading as I braced myself to face the eruption that was about to commence "A geth."

**.x.**


	11. Comfort and Ambition

**.11.**

**-Comfort and Ambition-**

**.x.**

_If it was up to me,_

_I would've never_ _walked out,_

_so until the sun burns out_

_oh, I hope you're waiting._

_[The Suffering – Coheed & Cambria]_

**.x.**

The geth became shortly thereafter known as Legion, the name bestowed upon him by EDI after our return to the Normandy. I'd made it clear in the colony before we departed that I already considered him a part of the crew and that the choice belonged to me and me alone. The only one to speak out against it at that point was Jacob, but he reluctantly deferred to me after I explained in thorough detail just what had transpired while I'd been aboard the Collector vessel. The others quietly accepted my decision, though I was certain I would hear of their inner concerns in private and at a later time.

In the shuttle, the geth seated at my side, I asked for a rundown of the events of the past two weeks. It was Jacob that spoke first, his tone grim, his gaze constantly flitting to the machine next to me. "Shepard ... Miranda took issue with your decision to promote Garrus to Commander."

Grunt snorted. Garrus shook his head with a wry curve to his mouth, catching my eyes as he muttered, "That's putting it mildly."

"I'm not surprised." I said truthfully, unable to keep the irritation from my voice. "What happened?"

"She took it to the Illusive Man." Jacob replied.

I was unable to tell by either his tone or expression whether he had felt the same as Miranda about my choice. "And?" I prompted, wondering if there was any possible way, once I was back onboard the Normandy, that I could shove the dark-haired Cerberus nightmare out of an airlock without being noticed.

"And he supported your decision."

My eyebrows shot up. That was unexpected. I looked to Garrus, who nodded confirmation. Leaning back and crossing my arms over my chest, I asked, "And how did Miranda take it?"

"I think," Jacob said diplomatically, "that you may need to speak with her when we get back."

I considered this, nodded and tilted my head back until it rested against the cool interior of the shuttle wall. Garrus began to speak then, relating to me what all had happened during my time away. The Illusive Man, after relaying orders to the crew of the Normandy that the turian was now effectively in charge, forwarded two more dossiers to Garrus regarding persons of interest. The first was Tali'Zorah, a quarian woman I knew very well from my time as a Spectre. The second was a veteran mercenary, Zaeed Massani. They had recruited the mercenary, who had then revealed that his joining the team hinged upon a deal made with Cerberus. Garrus himself had led the subsequent mission, hunting down and eliminating an old acquaintance of Massani's, and as a result the mercenary had taken up residence in the Normandy's port cargo area.

During the rest of the time, Garrus explained, Mordin and several of Cerberus' top scientific minds—offered up by the Illusive Man—had worked feverishly at attempting to understand the reason for the Collector's genetic research. While the exact goal of the experimentation still eluded them, they'd come upon a horrific discovery: the Collectors had once been Protheans, but over the eons had evolved to their current insect-like state by means of extensive genetic manipulation. During Mordin's research, Garrus and the others had combed the Terminus Systems, trying to locate the Collector vessel I'd been lost on by visiting remote human colonies they deemed likely targets.

I was silent as Garrus spoke, assimilating what I'd been told and finding myself deeply disturbed by the Prothean-Collector relation. When he finished, I thanked him and looked to Legion. "Did your people know anything about this? About the Protheans becoming Collectors?

His oculus had been angled towards the small shuttle's window, but swivelled back to me as I asked my question. He was quiet for a moment, the flaps above and surrounding his single eye moving in unison. "Our knowledge of the Old Gods is limited, Shepard-Commander. We are not heretics. We chose not to communicate with them when they first approached us. This knowledge is as ... surprising ... to us as it is to you."

My lips quirked a little at his choice of words; I had the impression he was indirectly attempting to put the others at ease by altering his way of speaking. "I thought as much. Thanks anyways."

He nodded once, turning again so that the light from his oculus shone upon the window which now revealed not the blue sky of the planet Yanna Opar, but the impenetrable blackness of space. I felt more at ease than I had in a very long time, knowing we were so near to Normandy, which had become more a home to me than any place else I could recall—even more so than the old Normandy. Thane and Samara, seated side by side, were conversing softly and from what little bit I could overhear, their topic of discussion involved different combat strategies using biotics. Both Jacob and Grunt were staring at Legion in manners that weren't quite friendly, but weren't openly hostile, either. Mordin, seated on the other side of me, was thoroughly engaged in perusing some data housed in his omni-tool. My eyes fell then upon Garrus to find that he was watching me in return.

I studied him intently, comfortably, not regretting the kiss I'd given him in front of the others. It had been more than anything else a declaration, not of love or passion, but of the fact that I had accepted completely how I felt for him, and how he felt for me. The stigma of an attraction between our two kinds, whose mutual animosity reached all the way back to the bloody and turbulent First Contact War, was a burden I refused to shoulder. We craved each other for who we were, rather than what we were. I wanted him for all the things that made him not human. I could have kept my intentions to myself, and in turn he and I could have engaged in a relationship kept secret from the others we served with. But I respected Garrus more than that—while I couldn't give him all my attention and devotion, I would try to give as much as he deserved. By kissing him the way I had, I'd informed the others I considered him far greater than just my equal and that I was completely at ease with what I felt.

As though knowing my thoughts—and perhaps he did—the edges of his mouth tilted upwards into that easy and edged turian smile. I smiled back, knowing he had understood the full implications of what I'd done and had accepted them. His gaze shifted to the window and mine followed and there I saw the Normandy, steadily growing nearer, dark and sleek and beckoning me home.

**.x.**

My first stop once aboard was the medical lab, at the insistence of Garrus and Mordin. Doctor Chakwas greeted me with a suspicious sheen in her eyes that hinted at tears, but after giving me a brief hug she briskly got down to the business at hand. A thorough examination of my form revealed no long-lasting, residual effects of my time in stasis and aside from the bruising caused by the recoil of the Widow rifle, I was fine. From the med lab I made my way across the mess area, being halted every few steps by members of the crew come to welcome me back, and eventually arrived at the door to Miranda's quarters.

She was seated behind her desk and glanced up as the doors slid open to grant me entry. Her face was unreadable. "Shepard."

"Miranda." I drew closer, stopping a few feet away. I'd opened my mouth to begin the reprimand I'd been mentally rehearsing during the scans in the med lab, but she spoke first.

"I supposed you've heard of my talk with the Illusive Man regarding your choice to put Garrus in command?"

"Yes."

Her eyes upon me were direct and unwavering, so pale a blue they reminded me of the ice-blanketed surface of Alchera, and they were about as warm. "I'll make no apologies," she said candidly, "I doubted your judgement. I still do."

I nodded, having expected this answer. Crossing my arms across my midsection, I regarded her in silence for several moments. There was nothing about her in that moment that I could even try to appreciate; she'd made it clear she didn't trust me from the first, and had persisted with that judgement all this time without even making an effort to learn more about me. Finally and purposefully I asked her, "What is it about Garrus you have an issue with? He's not human enough? Doesn't live and breathe Cerberus propaganda as you do?"

Her eyes narrowed. "He's not a leader, Shepard, and—"

"He managed to successfully organize and lead a group of vigilantes on Omega," I interjected.

"This isn't Omega. This mission is far more vital and has far more to it than just pissing off some merc groups."

"I chose Garrus because I know he can be an efficient leader, Miranda. I chose him because I trust him and because I know he would have made continuing this mission a priority. The choice was mine to make and mine alone."

She said nothing, her lips compressed into a thin, pale line. I went on, finally giving way to my ire, "_Your_ boss gave me this ship. _Your_ boss gave me the prerogative to recruit the suitable candidates he himself had found. Garrus was one of those. And let's not forget, it was _your_ boss that initiated, funded and oversaw the Lazarus Project."

"Everyone makes mistakes." She said in a voice far colder than the ice of her eyes.

An angry, mirthless smile flickered about my mouth. "That's right, I'd almost forgotten. Would I still be a mistake if he'd let you plant that killswitch in my brain?"

"I'm starting to believe bringing you back at all was a mistake, Shepard."

"But your boss doesn't think so," I told her softly and could feel that the upward curve of my lips had become mocking. This was the crux of Miranda's dilemma, and I saw my remark hit home. Color rose in her cheeks, her mouth tightening further into a taut line.

"This is _my_ ship." I took two steps forward and placed my hands flat upon her desk, leaning towards her. "And everyone on board will abide by my decisions. Your boss made it so. As much as you want to dispute it, choosing Garrus to command in my absence was a logical choice. You knew that, but your pride couldn't handle it."

"That's a damn l—"

"Shut up, Miranda. That's an order."

I had the satisfaction of seeing her mouth snap shut and her eyes widen, whether in rage or astonishment at my audacity, I couldn't be sure. I continued, "You preach and pretend to have the fate of humanity as your biggest concern, but when you should have been thinking about that and only that, you lost your head over Garrus' promotion. While you ran off to cry to the Illusive Man, it was Garrus and the rest of the crew working hard on the bigger issue at hand."

She said nothing, hands fisted tightly together in her lap.

"This is where we stand, Miranda. The next time you dispute any order I give, the next time you attempt to undermine my authority, I will see you off this ship. I don't care where we are. I'll maroon you on an asteroid if I have to. Like you said earlier, this mission is vital, far more vital than your tantrums and your wounded pride. Am I understood?"

Had it been possible, the fury in her glare would have been enough to see me torn and bleeding on the ground. When she didn't reply, I snapped, "Am I understood?"

"Perfectly, Commander." She ground out.

Satisfied, carried by a rush of vindictive triumph, I turned and stalked out of her quarters without another word.

**.x.**

It only took me a few minutes in his company to realize that Zaeed Massani was an asshole, but he was of a different type than Miranda. I liked his harsh and blunt attitude, liked too that he spoke what was on his mind when it was on his mind. We measured each other up, compared a few war stories, and shook hands. While I couldn't be certain of the specifics of his moral compass—wasn't sure I wanted to know—I did know that we needed his skill and fearlessness for this insane quest we found ourselves on.

From port cargo I made my way back up to the crew deck, and once there made a beeline for the mess area. I hadn't eaten anything since the day I'd been captured by the Collectors. Because I'd been in stasis all the functions and process of my body had been suspended, but now that I was free my hunger had gradually and with increasing demand reasserted itself. I procured a warm bowl of noodles in some manner of honeyed sauce from Mess Sergeant Gardner, spent a few minutes assuring him I was okay after my ordeal, and then hastily made my way to an empty table before anyone else could waylay me. I began to eat with quiet gusto, finding the meal to be quite palatable. I'd almost finished when I saw Garrus round the corner in front of my table. He saw me and altered his course to approach.

"Shepard."

I held up a finger, unable to speak for the noodle I was slurping in a most un-ladylike manner into my mouth. He watched, amused, as I chewed frantically and swallowed.

"I'm sorry," I said by way of rueful explanation. "I haven't eaten in a while."

"No apology necessary." He cast a glance around the mess area before sliding onto the chair opposite mine. Lowering his voice, he asked, "Did you talk to Miranda?"

I nodded, smiling fondly at the memory. "Oh yes."

"I know that expression, Shepard. Is she dead?"

I laughed at that. "No. Although I will admit to having the urge to kill her, or at least do some serious bodily harm. No, we had a little talk. Either she makes an effort to correct her behaviour, or we drop her off on the nearest uninhabited rock we fly by."

He chuckled. "I'll confess, I hope she keeps pushing. Being stranded on an uncivilized planet would do her a world of good."

"Agreed." I shovelled the last of the noodles into my mouth with what I hoped was a modicum of elegance. Garrus watched me eat with a faint smile, and when I pushed my bowl away and wiped at my mouth with the back of my hand, he spoke.

"You have a minute? There's something I need to talk to you about."

A teasing, semi-flirtatious statement was poised to fall from my lips, but I noted the way his eyes became suddenly shuttered and knew then that the issue at hand was a serious one. I nodded, standing and sliding the chair back, and gestured in the direction of the main battery. He rose as well and began to walk and I followed close behind. Once inside the battery he stood facing the weapons array. Staring at the line of his back, which had tensed the moment the door sealed behind us, I felt a small kernel of worry begin to churn in the pit of my stomach. Something was wrong.

I moved to take a seat on the same metal crate I'd occupied many days before during the last time we'd both been here alone. Recollections of just how that meeting had ended crept into the fringe of my thoughts, but I pushed them aside and waited for Garrus to speak. Finally he turned to face me, his expression a mix of anger and resolve.

"One of my contacts has found Sidonus."

I arched a brow, mutely urging him to continue. He sighed, a sound of weary frustration, and shook his head. "Look Shepard … I know we've got a lot going on right now. I know we're fighting a war bigger than any of our individual petty concerns, but …"

I knew instinctively what he wanted. "Where is he?" I asked quietly.

"The Citadel. He's paid someone for a new identity."

"I hope he didn't pay them too much, given you still know where he is."

Garrus' smile was both chilling and feral. "Sometimes it pays to have friends in low places. Shepard, I wouldn't ask this if I didn't think he might bolt. I don't know how long he'll remain on the Citadel, but I don't think it will be for long. I'll understand if you say no."

I was quiet as I thought about it. He was right—the situation as it stood didn't allow for personal crusades and vendettas, but it also didn't allow for any of the team to be distracted by unresolved issues. We all needed to have our heads in the game in order to pull off the miracle needed for victory, and so after a moment I nodded decisively. "We'll do it."

I could see some of the tension ease from his frame and he relaxed visibly. "Thank you, Shepard. I mean it."

I got to my feet and nodded again. "I know you do, Garrus. I'll tell Joker to head for Citadel space. We'll get this taken care of."

We stood facing each other in silence then. Suddenly, we were no longer Commander and subordinate. The ramifications of the kiss I'd given him on Yanna Opar hung suspended between us, a complicated, tangled mass that seemed right then to be too difficult to unravel.

He spoke first. "Turians don't come equipped to kiss as humans do …"

My laughter echoed throughout the main battery. "I like you without lips."

"Indeed." His flanged voice rumbled with mirth, but it faded as he went on, his mien abruptly solemn. "You sure about this? About the others knowing how we, ah … feel?"

"Absolutely." There was no hesitation in my answer. "Garrus, I don't care who knows. I'd go talk to the Illusive Man right now if you asked and tell him about what I want to share with you. Life is too short to not go for what's good and for what you really want. And I've already died once," I said, and then paused as I tried to structure my thoughts into some semblance of coherency. "I could've died on that ship. We could both die tomorrow—"

"Happy thoughts, Shepard," he said as casually as he would to remind me to switch the safety off before shooting.

"There's no shame in this," I fluttered a hand back and forth between us. "And I'm too old to be running around indulging in a secret romance."

Garrus snorted. "I'm far older than you."

Several sayings, most of them including references to age and experience, flitted through my mind, but I discarded all of them in an effort to appear dignified. Experiencing an unwelcome bit of uncertainty, I asked softly, "Was I wrong to do it?"

He sighed again, and I felt a little sinking sensation in the pit of my stomach. Maybe I'd read him wrong earlier—maybe while I'd been gone, he'd had a change of heart. As though reading my thoughts on my face, which was not an improbability by any means, he stepped towards me and said hastily, "No, Shepard, it's not that. Nothing about what I want has changed. It's just … I came across this old human saying, during my research." My hands balled into fists involuntarily as I recalled what just what he'd been researching. "`Better friends than lovers', you know?"

I nodded.

"I respect you far too much to jeopardize the relationship we've built. As much as I want you … and as much as you want me, I hope …" He cast a querying glance in my direction and wordlessly, I nodded again. "What if it's not what we want? What if we can't come back from it to the way we are now?"

"If," I told him and was gratified to find my voice remained steady, "you're not certain, Garrus, I will understand. But I know what I want. And I know it will be just like what we've experienced before—better, even."

His gaze was unflinchingly earnest. "If you're still sure, Shepard, then so I am."

I swallowed firmly, unable to find anything else to say to convey the strength of both my attraction and dedication. He took a step towards me, reached out and laid a hand against my cheek. "Turians aren't … as a race, we're not given to the same displays of affection and comfort as humans are. Humans use touch for so many things—and from what I've read, you crave it. Not just in terms of sex …" He trailed off, eyes leaving mine to roam the contours of my face and in an intense echo of what he'd just said, I found myself yearning for his touch.

"I want to comfort you, Shepard. I guess that makes me a bad turian. I don't know how—you may have noticed my race isn't really built in a way that accommodates … cuddling, I think it's called?"

"You're doing fine," I told him with a smile, and turning my head I pressed a kiss into the palm of his hand. His other arm went around me, settling about my waist and pulling me unresisting in against him. As he'd said, the sharp angles and odd contours of his body made for an awkward embrace, but after a bit of shifting about I managed to find the spot where we fit together just right. I laid my cheek against the hardness of his inhuman chest and found that if I listened closely his heart beat just as mine did. I turned my head and brushed my mouth across the line of his neck.

"You're okay?" He asked me, and the dual-tones of his voice vibrated in a very pleasant way against my lips. I knew what he was really asking me—whether I'd really come through my ordeals on the Collector vessel unscathed.

"I am." I assured him. Fleetingly, the image of the mother and her child danced in my mind, but I quickly locked it away. Slowly, reluctantly, I stepped away and out of his embrace.

"After … Sidonis …" he said haltingly, and I knew he'd been as affected by my nearness as I'd been by his. "When he's dead, and that mess is behind me … you and I, I want to, ah …"

"Me too." I said, and with great regret took my leave.

**.x.**

We arrived at the Citadel a full cycle later. I granted the crew a few hours leave. Garrus and I headed for the C-Sec office, armored and armed, on the hunt for a turian named Sidonis.

**.x.**


	12. Intentions, Misconstrued

__ _**PLEASE NOTE: This chapter and the one after it aren't showing up for some people (myself included). After digging around in the help forum, I discovered that this is an intermittent problem being experienced by many other authors. There is no current fix. Some authors have managed to work around the issue by deleting chapters and then re-adding them, which is what I have done here. Hopefully it works.**_

* * *

_**A/N: **__Some of the dialogue in this chapter is taken right from the game during Garrus' loyalty mission._

**.12.**

**-Intentions, Misconstrued-**

**.x.**

_No, I hope you die right now._

_Will you drink my chemical?_

_[Once Upon Your Dead Body – Coheed & Cambria]_

**.x.**

"So, Fade … couldn't make yourself disappear, huh?"

I watched as Garrus applied pressure to the human male's neck with his forearm, bracing himself and putting all his weight into it. His voice had changed since we'd cornered Harkin, dropping to in register to become low and menacing, a feral timbre creeping into the dual-tones. This change was echoed in the way he moved—echoed too in his eyes, which harbored within them now a furious, remorseless light. I had never seen him this close to the edge before, not even when we'd been brawling in the cargo hold of the Normandy. Every trace of the Garrus I'd known formerly and the side of him I had just begun to know was gone. He existed now only to have his vengeance, and I was beginning to think he'd do anything to make sure he had his shot at it, the consequences be damned. It was starting to concern me.

"Come on, Garrus," Harkin wheezed, clawing at the turian's arm without much success. "We can work this out—what do you need?"

Abruptly Garrus released him, turning and taking a couple steps away. "I'm looking for someone," he said over his shoulder.

Harkin pushed away from the wall tentatively, casting me a furtive glance. I still had my Locust—a replacement to the one I'd lost—trained on him and made no indication of lowering it. He looked back to Garrus, wiping his hands on his pants before crossing his arms over his chest in an attempt to regain his former confident appearance. "Well, I guess we both have something the other one wants."

Garrus' reaction was unexpected; the turian spun around and drove his armored knee hard into Harkin's groin. The human dropped to his knees, his breath leaving him in a whooshing groan. He remained there for long moments, clutching his wounded genitals with one hand, the other flat against the floor to support his weight as he struggled with the agony. My eyes moved to Garrus, who stood rigidly upright, hands repeatedly clenching into fists as he stared down at the human.

"We don't have to do this the hard way, Harkin," I said. Garrus shot me a warning glance, but I forged on regardless. "Tell us what we want to know, and you can be on your way."

Harkin shoved himself off the floor, coming to his feet gingerly. "Maybe I will," he said, dividing his pained glare between the two of us, "but I still haven't heard what you want."

"You helped a friend of mine disappear. I need to find him."

Harkin considered Garrus' words before responding slowly, rubbing at the back of his neck. "I … might need a little more information than that."

"His name was Sidonis. Turian, came from the—"

"I know who he is, and I'm not telling you squat." Suddenly belligerent, the human stepped up to Garrus, shaking his head.

From the corner of my eye, I could see Garrus' fringe flare outwards, a sure sign of impending aggression. Lowering my gun, I quickly asked, "Is the information really worth all the trouble?"

Harkin's expression as he looked at me was just short of a sneer. "I don't give out client information. Bad for business."

As I'd predicted, Garrus struck. He grabbed Harkin by the shoulders and pulled him down onto his raised knee. Once again, the human toppled, hitting the ground on his back. He was unable to do much more than lay there, however, as Garrus purposefully placed his boot across the human's neck. "You know what else is bad for business?" He snarled. "A broken neck."

I took a half-step towards him, lifting my arm in order to lay a restraining hand upon his shoulder. I stopped short, however, as he cast me a cold glare that warned I was not to interfere. Shaken by the intensity in his eyes, I caught my lower lip between my teeth and watched the scene unfolding with burgeoning apprehension.

"All right, all right! Get off me!" Harkin shouted, shoving at the turian's unmoving foot.

Garrus did not immediately comply, instead grinding down harder with his boot. Harkin began to make choking sounds, his distress unfeigned, and I stepped forwards to grab Garrus by the upper arm. He shook off my touch but stepped away, releasing Harkin, who rolled over onto his knees with his forehead on the ground, clutching at his throat.

"Terminus really changed you, huh, Garrus?" He rasped as he finally as he transitioned into a sitting position, leaning back against the wall.

"No … but Sidonis opened my eyes. Now arrange a meeting."

Garrus' voice had become flat and frighteningly devoid of any emotion. Harkin rolled his eyes and got slowly to his feet before limping his way over to a terminal near the door. As he contacted Sidonis and began to speak, Garrus lifted the pistol he held and turned it over as though examining it. I knew that in his mind he was using it to deliver the retribution he so wanted. We listened to Harkin's one-sided exchange in silence, and when the former C-Sec officer had finished, he turned to us.

"It's all good." He said. "He wants to meet you in front of the Orbital Lounge. Middle of the day. So if our business is done, I'll be going …"

Lightning swift, Garrus lunged and grabbed the man by the collar of his uniform. "I don't think so. You're a criminal now, Harkin."

"So, what? You're just going to kill me? That's not your style, Garrus."

Once upon a time I would have agreed with him. Watching Garrus now, at how fast he was breathing and seeing that unfamiliar and undeniably violent light in his eyes, I wasn't so sure. The turian stared down at Harkin wordlessly for long moments before letting him go and stepping back, shaking his head. I let out a pent up breath of relief that I hadn't been aware I was holding.

"Kill you? No. But I don't mind slowing you down a little." With that, he shot Harkin in the thigh. Stepping back, he added, "And maybe give C-Sec a blood trail to follow."

"Fuck … you, Vakarian," Harkin spat as he clutched his wounded limb.

Garrus lifted his pistol again, and I swiftly interposed myself between him and the human on the floor. "That's enough," I said in my Commander's voice. "He's not worth it. You know that."

"Get out of my way, Shepard."

He tried to push me aside with one hand, but I braced myself and shoved back. "You kill him now and it's murder, Garrus."

"It's what he deserves and you know it."

I refused to back down, and we glared at each other in the tense, charged silence that followed. Finally, he gave way, stepping back and sliding his weapon back into the holster at his back. I remained where I was, shielding Harkin until I was certain Garrus intended him no more harm. The turian backed away and I began to move, catching up with him as he turned. Together we headed towards the door.

"Sidonis better be there, or I'm coming back to finish the job." Were Garrus' last words to Harkin. There was no doubting the sincerity in his words.

Outside the small room, I grabbed Garrus and pulled him around to face me. His fringe was partially extended, his eyes narrowed to furious slits but he remained where he was and didn't attack as I half-feared he would.

"You're getting too deep into this, Garrus. You've got to keep a clear head."

"I'm fine," he snapped.

My eyebrows shot up. "Are you?" I demanded incredulously. "I've never seen you like this before. You were willing to kill in cold blood back there—he's a criminal, yes, but murder isn't the answer. Murder isn't what you do."

"People change. You of all people should know that."

I flinched as though slapped, so pointed was his remark. Immediately my own anger flared. "Harkin didn't kill your men. Save it for Sidonis, or you'll be doing this on your own."

He took a deep breath, held it for a moment, and exhaled. Slowly his fringe began to collapse and I watched as his frame relaxed slightly. "You're right, Shepard. I'm sorry." He passed a hand over his eyes and walked past, then halted and turned to face me. "I can't explain to you how much I want revenge for what he did to my men. It's … it's an awful feeling, but one I can't let go of. I lost control in there. It won't happen again."

But as I stared at him during his halting apology, noting the way his hands clenched, the way his serpentine tongue formed words from within the cradle of his needle-like teeth, I realized I didn't quite believe him.

**.x.**

"Let's get this over with." Said the turian named Sidonis as he came to a halt in front of me.

I fought hard to resist the urge to glance over my shoulder, where yards away Garrus stood upon a maintenance catwalk with a sniper's scope aligned to his eyes. All around us people went about their business—asari, volus, elcor—all of them oblivious to what was about to transpire. Sidonis had picked this part of the Citadel because it was crowded, but that hadn't deterred Garrus. Neither had my suggestions that we turn Sidonis into C-Sec rather than gun him down; my words had roused Garrus once more to a frightening, silent fury, and no other words on my behalf would turn him from his decision.

Garrus' voice filled my earpiece, his words clipped and tense. _"You're in my shot. Move to the side." _

"Listen, Sidonis, I'm here to help you." I said, making a choice on the fly that I knew would enrage Garrus beyond anything I'd ever seen in him before. I also know that to let him murder Sidonis this way would be a monumental mistake. I'd meant what I'd said earlier—Garrus was no murderer. He was so driven by the pain of Sidonis' betrayal that it had caused him to lose sight of all else during this hunt. Once Sidonis was dead he'd feel temporary vindication, but it was also an action that would haunt him for the rest of his life and I was determined to spare him from that.

Even if he wound up hating me for it.

Sidonis leaned in close, eyes continually scanning the moving crowds surrounding us. "Don't ever say that name aloud," he hissed.

"I'm a friend of Garrus," I said in a low, urgent tone. "He wants you dead, but I'm hoping that's not necessary."

Sidonis reared back, eyes widening in alarm. "Garrus … is this some kind of joke?"

_"Damn it, Shepard! If he moves, I'm taking the shot."_

I stepped nearer to the turian, trying to stick close in order to keep Garrus from getting a clear line of sight.

"You're not kidding, are you?" Sidonis demanded. I shook my head. He retreated three more quick steps and I followed, knowing that if I didn't he'd be dead in a heartbeat. "Screw this," he said, looking around wildly. "I'm not sticking around to find out. Tell Garrus I had my own problems …"

He began to turn away from me. I lunged forwards and grabbed him by the shoulder. "Don't move!" I ordered.

"Get off me!" He shouted in a rising panic, shaking off my hand.

"Shut the fuck up and listen!" I yelled, and then dropped my voice to a loud whisper as I caught sight from the corner of my eye people stopping to look at the scene we were creating. "I'm the only thing—the _only_ thing—standing between you and a hole in the head."

"…Fuck." Sidonis breathed as the implications of my words sank in. His eyes did a sweep of the area, searching futilely for Garrus, before centering on me again. "Look," he said, his words dripping with desperation, "I didn't want to do it. I didn't have a choice."

From Garrus, who could hear everything through my comm-unit mic, I heard, _"Everyone has a choice."_

"They got to me—said they'd kill me if I didn't help! What was I supposed to do?"

_"Let me take the shot, Shepard. He's a damn coward."_

To Sidonis, I asked, "That's it? You betrayed them to save yourself?"

There was a lengthy silence before he replied, and when he did there was nothing left in his voice but a heavy, weary resignation. "I know what I did. I know they all died because of me and I have to live with that." He turned and began to walk and hastily I followed, striving to keep myself between him and the barrel of Garrus' rifle. We approached a bench situated under some manner of large, exotic tree with fronds. He continued to speak then, looking at me in a manner that was almost beseeching, as though I could deliver unto him the absolution he needed. "I wake up every night, sick, sweating … each of their faces staring at me. Accusing me. I'm already a dead man. Food has no taste. Some days I just want it to be over."

_"Just give me the chance."_

I said quietly, "You've got to let it go, Garrus. He's already paying for his crime."

_"He hasn't paid enough. He still has his life."_

"Look at him, Garrus … he's not alive. There's nothing left to kill." Sidonis stood nearby, absolutely still, watching as I conversed with Garrus through the comm.

_"My men—they deserved better." _Even through the headpiece I could hear his voice tremble with the force of his rage.

Sidonis approached me, leaning down to speak, but it was a span of several moments before any words left his mouth, and shaking his head he muttered, "Tell him … I guess there's nothing I can say to make it right …"

I studied him in the long silence that followed. What I'd said to Garrus had been the truth: Sidonis was already dead. He looked tired and unwell, and I knew that he would grow more so as the weight of his actions wore him down over time.

In my ear, Garrus' voice was once again flat and emotionless. _"Just … go. Tell him to go."_

"He's giving you a second chance, Sidonis," I said, gesturing. "Don't waste it."

Pitching his voice to carry through my headset, the turian responded, "I'll try, Garrus. I'll make it up to you, somehow." To me he said, "Thank you. For talking to him."

I nodded and watched as he moved away and down the promenade. I turned then, raising my gaze to locate Garrus where he stood nearly hidden on the catwalk. He was still there, rifle no longer in his hands, and I said to him, "Head back to the Normandy. I'll catch up."

He didn't move. From this distance I couldn't see his face, but I didn't have to to know he was lost in a great and terrible fury because of what I had done. I didn't feel relief in having been able to save Sidonis. All I felt was a hollow ache in my chest; I didn't know if I could fix the rift between us this time.

"Head back to the Normandy," I repeated, "There's nothing left for us here."

_"Is that an order, Commander?"_

I closed my eyes and sighed, letting my head fall onto my chest and rubbing with one hand at a small ache in the back of my neck. Even when he'd first joined my team during our stint on the first Normandy, he'd never really spoken to me as a subordinate speaks to an officer. It appeared, however, that we'd just crossed that line, and I was dismayed to find that his mockingly obedient question hurt far more than I thought it would.

"Yeah." I said heavily, beginning to walk in the direction of the transport hub. "That's an order, Vakarian."

I wasn't surprised when my words were met only with radio silence.

**.x.**

I reached the Normandy's airlock at the same time he did. He refused to look at me and instead roughly brushed past; I reached out and caught at his arm but he wheeled about and shoved me hard into the nearest wall.

"I'm not sorry," I told him evenly, gazing up at him as he stood before me with both hands clenched, breathing hard under the strength of his anger. "The Garrus I know is not a murderer. You can hate me all you want but I won't apologize. I did what I had to."

"By what right, Shepard?" He hissed, fringe flaring. "Sidonis didn't betray _you_. He didn't kill _your_ men. His life was mine to take!"

"And when the guilt finally hit you, what would you have done then?"

"I would have dealt with it!" He shouted. "I would have lived with it!"

"Guilt like that isn't something you can just brush aside! It would have haunted you for the rest of your life."

"It was _my_ choice, Shepard!" Still breathing hard he took one step back, and then another, running a hand over his skull and down the tapered lengths of his fringe. Pinning me with his glare, he opened his mouth to speak but shook his head instead. I remained where I was as he wheeled around and proceeded through the Normandy's airlock with jerky, wooden strides.

I couldn't be certain, but the abysmal ache I was harboring in my chest right then could have been the beginnings of heartbreak.

**.x.**


	13. Between You and Me

_**PLEASE NOTE: This chapter and the one before it aren't showing up for some people (myself included). After digging around in the help forum, I discovered that this is an intermittent problem being experienced by many other authors. There is no current fix. Some authors have managed to work around the issue by deleting chapters and then re-adding them, which is what I have done here. Hopefully it works.**_

* * *

_**A/N: **__This chapter is dedicated to __**Sherryatom**__. I'd list all the reasons why, but they are far too numerous, and she knows them all already!_

**.13.**

**-Between You and Me-**

**.x.**

The hours after my return to the Normandy from the Citadel I determinedly filled with the plentiful tasks of leadership. I had briefly considered confronting Garrus but ultimately decided against it; he needed time to cool, and though I still believed I had made the right choice concerning Sidonis I couldn't help but feeling guilty. So it was that I made my way to the CIC and spoke at length with the Yeoman about the overall state of the team I'd assembled. I found her background as a counselor, as well as the extensive psychological profiles she assembled for each crew member, incredibly insightful. Part of the discussion consisted of questions directed at me in regards to my time aboard the Collector vessel; I knew she was only doing her job and trying to ascertain if I'd been mentally scarred by stasis or something else, but I was impatient and unwilling to be open about all I'd seen. My answers to her question were thus abbreviated. Finally, she gave me a prolonged hug that allowed her to wordlessly relay her relief that I was back and in one piece.

Following her recommendation that I become more familiar with some of the newest members of my team—and needing to keep my mind from wandering to the significant quandary that was Garrus—I headed to the crew deck, eventually ending up in the starboard observation lounge. Samara, seated cross-legged on the floor, haloed in the aura of her biotics, acknowledged me with a simple greeting and invited me to sit with her. I did so, inwardly hesitant at first—I hadn't had much time to converse with her, having been abducted by the Collectors not long after she'd been recruited. After we spoke at length, however, I found myself feeling oddly at peace, as though every problem and annoyance I'd had prior to entering had been banished by the serene intonations of her voice. We discussed asari culture, human history, the ways of the Justicar, and finally her thoughts on our mission. I was captivated by her mature beauty and composure—not in a romantic way, but in a manner of deep estimation. Here was a woman of extensive battle and life experience, a woman who forged her way through life with distinction and iron elegance and the tranquil manner in which she did so was something I greatly envied.

At last I reluctantly rose to my feet, knowing that the duties of leadership still awaited me outside the quiescent confines of this room. As I made to leave, however, she spoke.

"Shepard, I have enjoyed this talk. It has been many, many years since I've been in an environment where I could engage in discussion with such a unique gathering of individuals. I wanted you to know, I am grateful you came to me. I do not know you well, but I believe you are a woman of great integrity and I have seen the way the others follow you with unwavering faith in your abilities."

"Not all of them," I muttered, pleased by her praise but unable to help thinking of Miranda and wondering how true her words were when considering some of my past actions.

"I think you would be surprised to know how they feel about you, Shepard." Here she paused and smiled up at me. "Our turian friend included, but I believe that may be mutual …"

Blushing a little from both her compliments and by her astute observations, I took my leave with the promise of returning again sometime to continue our discussions. From there I made my way to the control room for Life Support, took a moment to ascertain my face was no longer flushed, and stepped inside. Thane was seated at a small table, facing away from the door. He turned in his seat to see who had intruded upon his solitude; seeing it was me, he gestured with one hand at the chair opposite his.

His silent, shuttered demeanour was difficult at first to crack, and I decided to be upfront and blunt. I apologized for not speaking with him sooner, which he waved away. Dcotor Chakwas had earlier informed me that his medical scans had been clean in the regard that his illness was not yet debilitating and would not be so for months, at least. I skirted around the topic of Kepral's Syndrome and instead asked him about his time aboard, about his outlook on our mission, about any suggestions he might have. His answers were at first succinct and candid, but the more we spoke the more communicative he became. From there our conversation drifted, and I asked with genuine curiosity about the drell, about their ties to the hanar, about his life as an assassin. Listening to him speak was almost hypnotic—the rasp of his voice was at intervals abrasive and lulling, an odd fusion that I quite enjoyed.

A considerable amount of time had passed when I realized I'd best go; I rose and bid him farewell. The mess hall was my next stop, where I procured a meal from the talkative Mess Sergeant and chose a seat from the small sea of empty tables. After I'd eaten, I headed for the AI core to speak with Legion, but was told to return later, as he was "building a consensus." I returned to the CIC, checked the terminal to see if I'd received any recent, consequential news, and then bid Kelly a good night as I headed for my cabin.

After a long and near-scalding shower, clad in the knee-length shift and the loose, thin, drawstring pants I used for sleeping, I padded down the short staircase and slid onto the small couch positioned there, tucking my knees beneath me and grabbing from the low table in front of me a datapad that contained all the data Mordin and the other scientists had compiled from the material gathered on the Collector ship. I had only read a bit, however, before my thoughts began to stray; staring unseeing at wall, I wondered for a long time just how to repair the chasm that had formed between me and Garrus. No solution was immediately forthcoming, however, and so I set the datapad down, rose and headed to bed.

Sleep came easy. The soft, pulsing bass of the music emitted by my holographic clock acted as a lullaby and I was out almost immediately. It was a deep and dreamless slumber, which of course meant that I was to be roused from it in a sudden, abrupt manner. A harsh beeping had awoken me and blinking confusedly into the darkness of my cabin, I listened intently to see if it would come again. It did, and realizing it was the chime at my door—which was locked automatically by the ship's embedded AI when I slept—I called out tiredly, "Open it, please."

I rose from the bed, rubbing at my face as the door's lock indicator switched from red to green. Most people would just contact me via communicator rather than come to my cabin, and thus I knew instinctively who would step through the door.

"Garrus," I greeted as he crossed the threshold. When I'd risen, the cabin lights had flickered on and I could see that he was clad in his uniform and that he kept his left hand fisted at his side. His gaze upon me was steady and direct. His expression was unreadable, almost remote. My heart rate had accelerated the instant he'd entered, but it was more out of concern than anything else. Was he here to vent his rage at the way I'd protected Sidonis? It seemed more than likely. I tried to keep from scowling; if he'd interrupted my sleep only to pick a fight, I was sure as hell going to give him a good one.

"Shepard." He said, and remained where he was.

"Come on, Vakarian," I said, crossing my arms. "Out with it."

His eyes shifted sideways to follow the paths my colorful, exotic fish were swimming within their huge aquarium. I tried and failed to check my sigh of impatience; I was tired and sleep was a precious commodity. At the sound, his attention centered back upon me.

"I won't say you were right to keep me from Sidonis," He said slowly. "You weren't. It was my call and you stopped me from making it. However—" He held up a hand as I opened my mouth to speak in my defense; I closed it again and he continued. "I understand—I think—why you did what you did. You thought that killing him would haunt me in the future."

"I don't think that. I know it."

His eyes narrowed in irritation and I could see him make a visible effort to check his temper. "If someone had crossed you the way Sidonis had crossed me, can you honestly tell me you wouldn't have done the same?"

He had me there. "No," I admitted. "But I know you, Garrus. Sooner or later it would have hit you that you'd killed—"

"A traitor? A man who was as much the murderer of my men as the mercs who gunned them down?"

"—a man in cold blood, just the way your team was killed." I finished calmly, refusing to let my own anger rise in response to his.

He made a noise borne of frustration. "Damn it, Shepard, I could have handled that!"

"Maybe. But it would have changed you, Garrus."

"I've survived change before, Shepard." He paused, curling his other hand into a fist as well, the tension fading from his face. "I changed when you died and here I am …"

"Here you are," I agreed softly, not knowing what else to say.

Neither of us spoke, then. I moved to sit on the couch, waving him over as I did so. It seemed like this was going to be a long discussion, when we finally got around to having it. I was on the verge of sinking down onto the cushions when from behind me, Garrus said my name. I turned, one eyebrow arched inquisitively.

He'd relaxed the hand that was a fist, and I saw he was holding something. I took a step forwards in order to get a closer look. I reared back in confusion when I realized that it resembled a medical syringe. My eyes rose back to his face, and he saw my question housed within them.

"It's … an autoinjector. When you were gone, on the Collector ship … I talked to Mordin about you. About us, I mean." As he spoke his gaze evaded mine, and I realized that he was acutely uncomfortable with what he was telling me. "Because turians are dextro-amino … there's a risk of a reaction with humans. Or so he said. He gave me this, in case …"

I couldn't speak immediately; my tongue had clove to the roof of my mouth as it dawned on me just what this was all about. For long moments I was simply overwhelmed by the knowledge that even when I'd been lost on the Collector ship—and for all he knew, dead—he'd refused to let go of the fledgling bond we'd shared. He had chosen to look to the future, one in which I'd return and even further than that, to the point where he and I could finally come together in the manner we both so desired. This was not just lust on his behalf. Garrus cared for me—cared deeply.

"That was kind of presumptuous of you," I said jokingly, but the effect was lost because of the way my voice wavered. I stood, wanting nothing more than to go to him, but found myself rooted to the spot by my own uncertainties.

"Shepard …"

That one word—my name—resonated with apology, with longing, with some other indefinable emotion that covered my skin with expectant chills. Propelled by what I heard I went to him, stopping only when I was very close. As his eyes bored down into my own, lit fervently from within, I reached up and cradled his face between my hands.

"Remember—I don't have lips," he whispered as I slowly rose up onto the balls of my feet. My reply was a fleeting smile and a kiss.

His mouth wasn't like mine, but I explored it anyways, brushing my lips across its edges, nibbling gently at his flesh. His arms went around me even as his breath left him in a sibilant hiss; his hands splayed out at my waist—I head the clatter as the autoinjector fell to the floor—and he hauled me closer until I was firmly nestled against him. As before, our bodies didn't quite fit, but the odd angles and edges of his form excited me, prompted me to press against him even more. I nipped at the ridge of his jaw, grazing him with my teeth and quite suddenly I went from being on the offensive to succumbing to his eager assault.

His mouth found my own—he didn't have lips, true, but that didn't mean he couldn't be innovative. One of his hands left my hip and crawled upwards until it found the curve of my breast; at the sensation of his palm cupping my flesh I inhaled quickly, mouth parting. His tongue, rough and thin and lissome, darted into my mouth and slid against my own as it delved. He tasted indescribably foreign and exotic, a taste that was quite simply _him_. I leaned into his unique kiss, tipping the balance my way, my tongue darting past his to slide against the sharp pinpricks of his teeth. Abruptly he pushed me from him, keeping me at arm's length, his breathing ragged.

"Shepard," he said, his tone only an octave or two above being guttural, "I'm not human."

"I know," I told him, comprehending what he was really trying to say. "And I don't care."

His smile was wolfish and ephemeral, a baring of teeth. His hands on me tightened but I resisted, twisting free. Before he could voice his question, I slid my hands beneath the fabric of my shirt and swiftly shrugged out of it. As it fell from my fingertips I turned to face him fully, my breath catching in my throat at the look on his face.

"You're so different from—I knew what to expect, but you—the way you are," his voice was halting, nearly inaudible, "is doing _things_ to me, Shepard …"

He stepped nearer and grabbed for me, but I eluded his grasp with a deft step sideways. I hooked a finger beneath the drawstring of my pants and he stilled. As I shimmied out of them with what I hoped was sensual grace the only sound was that of our fast, mingled breathing. They pooled around my feet and I stepped out of them; he caught me with a quicksilver lunge, his hands settling again at my hips in a manner that was wholly possessive.

"You're …" He started, but shook his head, unable to finish. His hands glided upwards, over my ribs and I uttered a breathless laugh, squirming, as his rough skin tickled my own. At the sound, he paused in his physical study of my naked form, gazing at me with a kind of curious awe. "I read about this," he said, reversing his path so that his hands skimmed back down my sides. To my great horror, I couldn't stop a giggle from erupting from my mouth. I heard his soft laughter rise in reply. "Interesting fact about you, Shepard … now I know your weak spot."

"Garrus, you—"

"Hush." And his hands were suddenly on my exposed breasts, fingers sliding over my hardened nipples and then pausing there as I gasped and leaned into his touch. "I read about this too …" he breathed before wrapping one arm tightly about my waist, bending me slightly backwards and lowering his head.

His tongue was on my flesh, dragging over my nipple and as though from a distance I heard myself keening low in my throat. His tongue withdrew and then his teeth closed carefully over the nub and the pinpricks of feeling were an incredible, inescapable rush that left me gasping. I clung to him as though in a drugged haze, and when he lifted his head so that it was equal with mine it took me long seconds to bring his face into focus.

"You did your research," I whispered.

He smiled again, a satisfied, entirely male curve of his mouth. He pulled me in close, cradling the back of my head with one hand, pressing me against his chest and like before I could hear his heart and I loved that it was racing just as mine was. I felt his mouth move against my hair as he spoke. "I want this. I want you. Do you know how much?"

I nodded, and knowing it wasn't confirmation enough I twisted just enough to press my lips hard against the solid column of his throat. "I do," I mouthed, knowing he'd be able to understand. "I need it, too."

"But," I added in a more audible tone as his head shifted and his mouth found the contours of my neck, "I also need you naked."

"Ah." He let me go, hands trailing reluctantly over my skin before falling away completely. He looked at the floor, looked at the wall behind me as he repeated what he'd said earlier, this time in warning, "I'm not human, Shepard …"

"That's why I like you so much."

He shook his head, his smile flickering in and out of existence. "Remember, you asked for this. Turian anatomy isn't—"

"I know."

"Turians aren't—"

"I don't care."

His laugh was a brief expulsion of air. "Well, then."

I stepped backwards until the edge of the bed met with the backs of my legs and I sat down slowly, reclining on my elbows as he began to disrobe. I watched the process with as much curiosity as desire—everything about him was something I didn't know, something deliciously unique. He peeled out of his uniform, quickly shedding the top first and then following with the rest. My eyes roamed appreciatively over the exposed expanse. I knew that turian evolution had led to the development of their thick, exoskeleton-like skin, that the top halves of their bodies were similar in way to a carapace. His form was sleek, sharp lines and angles that combined to make him the very image of a predator. Protective plating ran from his back over his shoulders to convene in a line down his chest. His waist was slender, also covered in layered plating and it flared sharply outwards into the rounded concave that were the joints of his hips. His legs were long, powerfully curved, the spurs that rose from his calves vaguely S-shaped.

My attention, predictably, was caught and held by the evidence of his excitement situated between his thighs. I'd done my own research—though admittedly nowhere near as much as Garrus had—and I knew that the genitalia of the male turian was for the most part housed internally. Upon arousal, the protective covering that shielded it spread open, allowing for the act of mating. Garrus' was now completely exposed to me, his shaft hardened and elongated and of considerable size, thickly ridged on all sides in such a way that I felt a sudden, animalistic surge of lust as I thought about just how it would feel …

"Do I meet the qualification standards?" He asked me in a tone meant to be light, but I heard the underlying uncertainty.

Staring at him before me, tall and inhuman and so very, very male, I had to swallow thickly before replying and when I did my voice was hoarse. "Oh, yes."

As he approached, as my mind wandered down paths I sincerely hoped reality would quickly follow, I knew right away that traditional sex such as I knew it wasn't an option. The spurs on his legs wouldn't allow for him to be flat on his back and the location of his cock would make standard missionary more difficult than it needed to be. He stopped at the foot of the bed and I stood, reaching out and running my hands down his arms, down his sides, before letting them trail across the plating of his navel. My fingers closed gently around the hardened length of him; he groaned, his head falling forwards, his own fingers clutching at my shoulders with bruising force. I stroked him once, twice, watching the pleasure ripple across his features, watching his eyes close. I could feel him expanding in my grip, the ridges pushing against my flesh and I shuddered to know that soon, very soon, I would feel that within me—

"Enough … Shepard, please—enough," He gasped, grabbing my wrists and pulling my hands away. I complied with great reluctance. A slow and steady throbbing had started in places low in my body, and I could feel myself getting wetter with each passing second. I had only one thing on my mind, and with that primal directive driving me I caught at his hand, leading him to the couch.

"Wait—" He said as shoved him down upon the cushions; he shifted so that his spurs wouldn't catch on the edge. I stepped in as close as I could, straddling his legs, but he caught me by my waist to prevent me from lowering myself into his lap.

"I know you—human women—need ah, warming up? Before …" His fingers flexed at my waist and even that simple touch had me biting my lip. "Shepard … I don't want to hurt you …"

"You won't," I said.

He took me at my word, pulling me down so hard and so fast that my head nearly collided with his. I squirmed, trying to arrange my limbs in order to accommodate what I wanted so badly, and the movement had him hissing in my ear as I ground against his engorged shaft. Finally, my knees cradling his thighs, I felt the tip of him brushing at the entrance to my body. My eyes locked on his, I reached down and gripped his cock; holding my breath in exquisite anticipation, I carefully guided him into me.

His girth was considerable and I pressed down slowly, so slowly, as he stretched my inner walls beyond anything I'd ever known before. It was pain and pleasure in turns; when I closed my eyes in a brief spasm, his hands at my waist stopped me from moving any further. "Are you in pain?" He asked, his words no more than a strained growl. I nodded, opened my eyes, and nipped at the edge of his mouth in reply. His hands then assisted as I continued sliding down his length. Finally, thankfully, he was fully sheathed within me. The sensation had me panting; he shifted and I felt the ridges of his cock grind against me, pushing into me and I bit out his name on a moan of sheer pleasure.

"Shepard …" He gasped as I clenched hard around him, and he began to move, pushing into me with short , supressed shoves. Every thrust had me writhing as the ridges lining his shaft stroked all the relevant nerve endings. I wriggled my hips and pressed down as hard as I could, needing to take him all, to feel him all; as I did so my name exploded from his mouth, his taloned fingers biting into my skin. I wanted him to take me as the turian he was—I wanted him to be unafraid of hurting me, and so I leaned down, nuzzled at his neck and bit down hard while at the same time clenching hard around his cock. He understood instantly, thrusting up so hard I would have been unseated if not for his iron hold. I rode him as he surged rhythmically into me, gripping his thighs with my own, biting at his neck, the line of his jaw, the corners of his mouth. My arms were draped over his shoulders, holding onto the back of the couch in order to brace myself, to use for leverage as I slid down to meet his upward plunges. I was aflame. Every time he slid back into me I would reactively tighten, his ridging driving me insane as it rubbed and bumped all the right places within my wet and aching core.

Too soon I felt the pleasure begin to crest, and as I hurtled towards my impending release I buried my face in the hollow between his neck and shoulder. Gripping me tightly, he thrust so deep that it pushed me over the brink and I cried out, unashamed, as I came with a force so great that the universe swam around me. He followed me immediately, burying himself to the hilt with a groan so primal that it shook his body before he erupted, pulsing with me as he ground out my name.

"Fuck …" I whispered some long seconds later, when I could blink without seeing stars and my mouth could finally form words. My head still lay against his shoulder, my mouth rested at his throat.

"Yeah." He said, and I smiled to hear the absolute contentment within that one word.

We were quiet after that for a period of time. I still straddled him and he was still buried within me, but neither of us made any effort to move. With one clawed finger he traced lazy circles along the bared expanse of my back. I ran my hand in an aimless exploration over the plating of his chest. I felt then utterly complete, perfectly at ease and I cherished it, because I knew this was something I would only ever experience with Garrus.

"So," he ventured finally, the words vibrating against my lips, "I'm not really sure where we go from here …"

"Garrus." I straightened, catching his face in my hands. I kissed him once, running my thumbs over the strong lines of his jaw. "This was … this was beyond words. And please be assured that I still want it—I think I'll always want you. Nothing has changed about how I feel. But I need to know, do you feel the same?"

"Oh yes," he murmured, and at that exact moment I realized that within me, his cock was beginning to expand once more, its ridges sliding against my innermost walls in a tantalizing, torturous way. He smiled, reaching up to brush away an errant strand of hair from my face; I caught his wrist and licked a line across the palm of his hand. He chuckled softly and pushed upwards gently, just enough so that he stretched me around him, just enough to cause me to catch my breath on a mingled curse and plea.

"Oh yes," he repeated, hands grasping at my waist to pull me down firmly upon his shaft, to ensure he was once again fully sheathed. "I promise, Shepard, I feel the same."

**.x.**

_I'll touch it if you ask me to, but how is up to you._

_[The Camper Velourium I: Faint of Hearts – Coheed & Cambria]_

**.x.**

_**A/N: **__I finally got here! Thank you (so much!) for your patience. And thank you, again, to all of you who have reviewed. Your words are like fuel to the fire—they give the drive I need to keep going!_


	14. Here We Are, Juggernaut

**.14.**

**-Here We Are, Juggernaut-**

**.x.**

"Just like old times!"

Crouched behind a stack of shipping crates, ducking and covering my head as a rocket fired by a geth sailed overhead to explode against the concrete wall only yards away, I heard Garrus' exclamation clearly over the comm. Had my attention not been wholly focused on avoiding enemy fire, I would have smiled at his words. Another rocket struck the wall several feet from the first, pelting me with debris; from beyond the safe boundary of the crates came a steady stream of energy rounds from multiple geth pulse rifles. Past the pyramid of shadow cast by the shipping boxes in which I huddled the ground steamed and hissed, the air all around it wavering from heat. Haestrom was not a welcoming planet, its parent star having grown even more unstable in the years since the quarians had been forced to abandon it. Subsequently, survival on the planet was dictated by how quickly you could get out of the blistering, deadly sunlight and into any kind of shade.

The Illusive Man had finally pinpointed the location of my former teammate, Tali'Zorah. She was on Haestrom as part of a scavenge-research reconnaissance mission dispatched by the Migrant Fleet. It was a terribly risky venture on their behalf, as there was extensive orbital geth construction around Haestrom. I'd hoped to arrive and secure Tali before the geth became aware of their intrusion, but my luck held out the way it usually did, and we found ourselves far behind enemy lines while chasing after the steadily retreating quarian squad.

Until now. We'd managed to close the gap, fighting our way through geth primes and and destroyers and managing to establish tenuous communications with the remainder of the quarian forces. We learned that Tali'Zorah was—for the moment—secured in a room at the far end of what had once been a construction yard. Upon arriving there we encountered the only other quarian survivor aside from Tali, a marine named Kal'Reegar. From him we learned that there were significant impediments to our reaching Tali in a timely fashion. Kal'Reegar had been wounded in his attempt to get to Tali and had offered to act as a distraction, sacrificing himself in order to give me and my team the opportunity to get safely across the yard. I'd managed to talk him down from what would have been tantamount to suicide, convincing him instead to remain safely behind a concrete barrier to provide what he could in the way of cover fire.

Garrus had taken up position near Kal'Reegar, sniping at any geth that moved out in the open. I suspected he was enjoying himself immensely; overwhelming odds were something he dealt with better than most. Crouched with my back against the metal grating of a crate, I ejected the spent thermal clip from my Locust and rammed home another before turning to Legion, who knelt at my side.

"Tell me about the Colossus," I ordered, referring to the massive, four-legged, long-necked mechanical beast that awaited us at the far end of the yard.

"It is a hybrid, Shepard-Commander," he replied. "We surmise it was originally an Armature, but it has been altered from its original form. "

"What," I asked, having to shout over the whistling scream of another rocket, "does that mean for us?"

"It possesses two main weapons: a long-range siege pulse cannon and short-range automatic mass accelerators. Its shielding and armor are substantial and it has the ability to self-repair. We recommend a flanking maneuver with heavy weapons fire—once its shields fail, it will be forced to enter a preservation mode. That is when it will be most vulnerable."

His recommendation sounded nearly impossible given the location of the Colossus and the large number of geth we'd need to eliminate in order to get to it, but we didn't have much else in the way of options. Thinking fast, propelled by an alarmed shout from Kal'Reegar as a blast from the Colossus' cannon impacted with the concrete barrier he and Garrus were using for cover, I risked sticking my head out from behind the crates to take a swift look at the situation as it stood.

As I suspected, it wasn't good. "Legion," I said, turning back to him, "has your tactical cloak been repaired?"

"Yes."

"Good." The rolling boom of the cannon sounded again and this time the ground beneath us shook violently. Bracing myself with one hand, I gestured with the Locust as I gave my orders. "I'm going to need you on my six. Keep your cloak up until I say. We need to create some crossfire. " With a thrust of my chin I indicated a raised catwalk to our right. "I'm going to rush that. You tail me. Once I'm in cover I'll give you the word. Got it?"

"Yes."

I glanced in Garrus' direction, knowing he'd heard every word through the comm. He was crouched with his back to the wall, rifle held in two hands with Kal'Reegar close beside him. He caught my look and nodded and I heard the unspoken warning that passed between us in that one fleeting glance: _be careful._

"Always am," I said in reply. I swivelled back to Legion and clapped him on the shoulder before moving past him in a walking-crouch. He activated his cloak and rippled out view. I inhaled slowly, deeply, brought the Locust up to bear, and burst from cover. Both Garrus and Kal'Reegar opened up with their weapons in order to keep the geth distracted as I ran, but even with their interference I was dodging bursts of energy from enemy rifles. I thudded over the flat expanse of concrete, my path serpentine as I tried to keep out of the light of the sun. Some exposure was impossible to avoid and my hardsuit beeped insistently at me as my kinetic barriers steadily depleted under the harsh solar radiation. I wondered, belatedly, how Legion's cloak would hold up against the same and fervently hoped it would last as long as I needed it to.

The Colossus' cannon fired again and I saw from the periphery of my vision the bright, blue-white bolt hurtling towards me. I dove, tucked and rolled unevenly across the pitted stone, coming to a rough halt and throwing my hands over my head as the blast struck the wall only a few feet away. Chunks of rock rained down around me, some of them large enough to sting through the thick layers of my armor. I was laid out in the open and the light of Haestrom's expanded sun was painfully, blindingly harsh, accompanied by the searing heat; I got to my feet as quickly as I could and bolted for a large rectangle of shade provided by an ancient piece of abandoned machinery. I paused there only for a moment, until my barriers hummed back up to full strength, before jumping forth and resuming my mad dash.

I hit the ramp leading to the catwalk and charged up it, aware of the Colossus' head turning to track my progress and aware too that there were geth awaiting me on the catwalk. Reaching the top, I sprinted towards another derelict piece of equipment and slid in behind it. I could hear the garbled, mechanized sounds that indicated that the enemy was near. Tightening my grip around the Locust, I leaned to the side, pinpointed a geth that was steadily advancing on my location, and pulled the trigger. I emptied the clip and it staggered backwards; executing a seamless reload as it recovered, I resumed my stance, fired again and watched as it fell backwards, twitching twice before falling still. From behind it another was approaching and I recognized its type immediately. It was a destroyer, its entire form a dark red and I experienced then a small pang of alarm; when destroyers weren't being irritating as all hell from a distance by wielding rocket launchers, they were making everyone miserable by engaging in close combat with flamethrowers. It made only perfect sense that this particular destroyer was equipped with the latter weapon.

Though a distance of ten or twelve feet still separated us, I reflexively ducked back behind the defunct machinery. A heartbeat later a stream of fire shot past with a whooshing, deadly roar. I waited until the jets of flame died away before lunging sideways, coming into the open with my finger clamped down over the trigger and the barrel of the Locust aimed in the general direction of the geth. I loped sideways, heading back to the ramp because being confined in a corner, regardless of whether or not it had cover, was not a good place to be when facing an opponent with a flamethrower. To add to all the other daunting factors that made the destroyer an enemy to avoid, it possessed a more than adequate shielding system. It was quickly closing in on me, and I had no wish to test my own shields against a full blast from the flamethrower when they were already being taxed by the radiation; I came to a halt, sighted quickly and hoped for accuracy before firing off a quick burst. I hit the fuel tank attached to the flamethrower and with a hissing shriek the compressed, flammable gas began escaping from the puncture. The destroyer hesitated. I steadied my aim and fired again before quickly dropping and turning in order to avoid the subsequent explosion.

I was back on my feet and running hell-bent up the ramp instantly, skirting around the flaming wreckage of the destroyer. Legion hadn't broken his cover to assist me and I was thankful for that, for he was my element of surprise. I hurtled past the machinery I'd used for cover and headed for the far end of the catwalk. Another burst from the Colossus, however, forced me to seek shelter in the small shadow of a lone shipping crate. From this vantage point, facing back the way I'd come, I could see that Garrus and Kal'Reegar had done an admirable job at thinning the enemy geth ranks. While they weren't all gone, their numbers had been thinned considerably.

I shifting, my gaze running down the length of the yard and I could see two geth on the ground level, sheltered from Garrus' shots by a massive piece of construction machinery, drawing a bead on me; the crate at my back wouldn't protect from their fire. "Legion, now!" I shouted, shifting to one knee and sighting through the bars of the catwalk railing. My aim had been low, striking the nearest of the geth in its legs. I adjusted my aim and my bullets chewed their way up its metal torso. It tottered backwards and fell and at the same time I heard the stentorian roar of Legion's Widow rifle. The second of the geth below dropped instantly, having fallen prey to Legion's unerring aim.

"Hold there," I directed the friendly geth, my words fast and breathless into the comm. "Pick off any you can. I'll head further up and get any I can. We should be able to deal with the remainder with the crossfire."

"Understood, Shepard-Commander."

Legion had taken up position behind an L-shaped arrangement of old, rusted fuel drums. Like his antagonistic brethren, he was able to withstand the brutal solar radiation and didn't need to seek the shadows for safety. Feeling considerably more secure now that I knew he could guard my back, I eased out from behind the crate, scouted the area ahead for geth, and finding the way clear rose to my feet and began to run again. My target destination was the end of the catwalk, where the railings had been replaced with thick metal sheets. I could take cover there and work at taking out any remaining geth while also having a clear line of fire at the Colossus.

I'd crossed the halfway mark when something hit my midsection_, hard_. I immediately doubled over, wheezing while something struck me again in the middle of my exposed back. The Locust fell from my grip and I dropped to all fours and rolled instinctively; on my back staring up, I found I'd narrowly missed taking a point-blank shot to the head as fired by the geth hunter that stood looming over me.

I hadn't seen the hunter, because like Legion, geth hunters were outfitted with a cloaking system. They stood taller than the other types I had encountered, and their favored—and effective—tactic was to make use of their stealth to close in and attack with the energy weapon that was their version of a shotgun. Said shotgun had shifted and was centered directly over my face. I lunged forwards and up, tackling it around the knees with the hopes of bringing it down. It was like trying to tip an anchored boulder and the hunter only stumbled back a few steps before regaining its balance. That was all the time I needed, however, to get back to my feet. The hunter swung around with the shotgun; I threw myself at it again, knocking aside the arm holding then weapon.

My hardsuit had begun beeping as my kinetic barrier began to deplete again beneath the onslaught of the sun. It was imperative that I overcome the hunter and get out of the harsh light, but the hunter grasped me by the upper arm and suddenly we were locked together in a grapple. My hand was locked about the limb that held the shotgun in an attempt to keep it from pointing it in my direction but the force the hunter was exerting was tremendous and my arm trembled as I fought to keep it at bay. The low-shield warning emitted by my hardsuit had become a continuous, high-pitched wail and I knew my shields were only seconds from failing completely. I kicked low at the leg closest to me. The hunter was unaffected. Growing desperate, I pulled backwards and succeeded in wrenching free of its grip on my shoulder. Balling my fingers into a fist, I aimed for the hunter's single, glowing eye.

My first blow was a glancing one. My second struck true, and with a garbled, machine-like shriek the hunter reeled back as the solid, thick armor of my gloves shattered the outer covering of its oculus. As it shook its head, effectively blinded, I made an attempt to wrest the shotgun from its grip. The hunter abruptly toppled forwards, hitting its knees before collapsing entirely and I had to leap back to avoid being caught beneath it. Uttering a silent thanks to Legion for his assistance, I wheeled around, bent to retrieve the Locust, and bolted towards the shade offered by the sheeted railing at the end of the catwalk.

"I'm here," I panted, alerting the rest of my team that I'd arrived at my destination. My hardsuit had fallen silent and a quiet hum informed me my kinetic barrier was beginning to regenerate. "How many left?"

From afar, I could hear a single shot from Garrus' rifle. "That's the last I can see," the turian informed me.

"All platform heretics appear to have been eradicated, Shepard-Commander." Legion added.

"Which just leaves the big guy." I hazarded a glance over the top of the railing to find the Colossus very near, on the level below me, its bright singular eye focused in my direction. Having a fix on me, it began to fire its secondary weapons, which beat against the metal sheeting I hid behind with enough force to shake the entire catwalk. "Garrus," I asked, "how is Kal'Reegar?"

"He's stable, Shepard, but I don't think he's up for taking on that thing."

I nodded though he couldn't see me. "Okay. I want him to stay there. You have any heavies?"

He said nothing for a minute, but finally replied with, "Grabbed a rocket launcher off one of the geth. Several rounds left."

"Good." Shifting, I flipped the Locust into its compact position, returned it to the holster at the base of my spine. From where it rode against my upper back I removed my own heavy weapon, one of Collector design that the others had taken during our ill-fated venture onboard their ship. It was, Mordin had discovered upon examination, a particle beam emitter. Like most beam weapons, he'd advised, it would be extremely useful against pretty much all manner of armor and shielding. Unfortunately, I hadn't had the chance to field test it yet. _No time like the present_, I thought darkly as I flexed my fingers around its oddly shaped grip.

"Legion, are you able to target the Colossus?"

"Affirmative."

"You know its weak spots—work on those. Garrus, I need you to move up as quick as you can—stay out of the sun, stay in cover. Legion and I will work to draw its attention. Open up on it when you have a clear shot."

"Understood, Commander."

From where I knelt, I could see across the yard and watched as Garrus eased out from behind the concrete wall and headed swiftly down the ramp to the ground level, clinging to the shadows as he ran. Legion began firing with the Widow, the shots near deafening as they resounded around the yard. The Colossus switched targets, honing in on Legion with its secondaries, intermingling the rapid fire with that of its main cannon. My comrade geth ducked under cover, and I rose up on my knees to begin my own attack. The particle beam fired smoothly, with no kick and with extreme precision. I focused my attack on the segmented joint of its hindmost legs and was surprised at how quickly I cut through its shields. The Colossus shifted its attention back to me and I ducked back down as energy rounds bit into the stone wall behind me.

Legion took up where I'd left off, firing three rounds in quick succession. I heard a grinding screech followed by the noise of metal buckling beneath pressure and I knew that we'd collectively managed to cripple the Colossus.

"It will enter repair mode," Legion warned over the comm.

"Garrus?" I questioned.

"On it," came the response, words punctuated by fast breathing.

I heard the sound of a rocket being fired and twisted around to peer over the metal panel. The Colossus had tipped and was braced at an awkward angle, having lost one of its four legs. Its massive head had swivelled to seek Garrus, who was by now out of sight somewhere within the maze-like arrangement of shipping crates and old machines. With the particle beam I aimed for the joint of the leg nearest me and fired; I heard Legion do the same a heartbeat later.

Caught between three enemies in different locations, the Colossus was unable to effectively focus its fire. It jerkily re-adjusted its aim at intervals in an attempt to suppress us all. It lost another leg and toppled even further, its heavy, oblong shaped torso sliding with an ear-piercing shriek across the rough concrete of the ground. Even as it fell Garrus slid out from cover and fired twice with the launcher. Sensing the imminent victory and impatient to get to that point, I refused to lower myself into cover when next the Colossus' head swung my way, instead directing the beam of my weapon directly into its singular, glowing maw.

Its pulse cannon fired twice. Even as I threw myself backwards, the Colossus' head exploded under the dual impact of Garrus' rockets and Legion's bullets. Unfortunately for me, the part of the catwalk upon which I knelt had been significantly weakened by earlier weapons fire and the final two bursts from the cannon were all that was needed to finally sever the metal struts attached to the concrete of the wall. The catwalk groaned, shuddered, and suddenly I was sliding downwards at an extreme angle with steady, dangerous acceleration.

"Shepard-Commander—!"

Crates and assorted pieces of ancient quarian junk raced past me to land in a cluttered heap at the point where the edge of the fallen catwalk met the ground. I was headed directly for that pile and there was no escaping it; my fingers as they scrabbled at the grate of the catwalk found no purchase. Desperately, I tried to tuck in upon myself, throwing my arms up and around my head as I braced for impact.

I hit a mound of broken shipping crates shoulder-first and cried out as pain lanced through me. I had no time for any other reaction, for the remainder of what had been on the catwalk with me was tumbling my way; I tightened into as small a ball I could manage and shouted as more crates, mixed with fuel barrels and thin slabs of metal, crashed down all around me.

"Shepard!"

Garrus' voice. It was dark all around me, though my haphazard prison had cracks aplenty with which to allow thin streams of sunlight entrance. I moved hesitantly and froze as the pile of objects around me creaked alarmingly. I was in pain, yes, but it was a winded, bruised kind of pain and I was fairly certain nothing was broken. Kinetic barriers were good for more than just stopping bullets, after all. Garrus shouted my name again and it was nearly deafening through the earpiece.

"I'm alright," I said, hazarding moving my legs. They brushed against a piece of the collapsed grating, which trembled in a way that suggested it might fall inwards. I stopped moving and tried to look around as best I could, which didn't accomplish much, given I could only move my neck less than a quarter turn in either direction. "Going to need help getting out of this, though," I added.

I heard the turian and the geth outside the confines of my jail minutes later. Harsh clanging sounds echoed around me as they wrestled with the objects that had me imprisoned. It wasn't long before I was exposed to full sunlight, and, squinting, was able to make out their forms as they stood silhouetted above me. Legion got to me first, reaching down with his hand extended. I clasped it, and he hauled me to my feet.

"Thanks," I told him, taking a shaky step out of the mess, followed by the two of them as I made my way to the shade provided by a large overhang. I halted in my tracks, however, remembering the particle beam I'd lost at some point during my tumble. I half-turned to go back for it when I saw that Garrus had it in his hands. With a nod, he handed it back to me.

"Thanks," I said again. I resumed my path, stopping for a moment to stare at the collapsed heap that had been the formidable Colossus. Moving past it, I made my way to a concrete ramp that led up to a single metal door set into the rock of the wall. The lock indicator was red, and I knew that past that barrier we would find Tali.

Legion had already stepped past me, moving up to the door and beginning to work at a circuit bypass. I watched him work, glancing at Garrus as he fell in beside me.

"That was close," he said, his eyes also on our teammate.

"It usually is, Garrus."

"You," he said, turning to face me fully, "need to be more careful. If anything had happened to you, I would have had to gone back to being Commander. I'm not very good at it."

I snorted. "And you would have had to gone back to reading Fornax for your kicks—"

I stopped speaking, mortified at what I'd just said, feeling a flush invading my face that was so potent the roots of my hair felt as though they were burning. Garrus burst out laughing. I looked at Legion, knowing that he would have heard my words over the comm, but the geth was still intent on bypassing the lock circuits. Since Garrus and I had become lovers—since that fact had become known to most the Normandy's crew—different members of my team had approached me in one way or another in order to express to me their well-wishes, their misgivings, or in Grunt's case, their blunt evaluation of just how turians would fail at being adequate mates. Legion had done none of those, for which I was extremely grateful.

"Fornax doesn't have much in the way of human females," Garrus said between chuckles, his grin as wide and genuine as I'd ever seen it.

"Shut up." I snapped, and my tone would have been authoritative if not for the way it wavered from my own suppressed laughter. Unable to keep the smile off my face, I made my way up the ramp to reach Legion. The lock indicator turned green just as I neared and Legion made to enter immediately, but I caught him by the arm with a shake of my head.

"Tali's quarian," I said, "I don't think she'll react favorably if you're the first thing she sees."

The geth considered this for a moment, the flaps around his oculus moving in staggered counterpoint to each other. "We do not wish to harm Creator Tali'Zorah."

"I know that, but I guarantee her first instinct will be to shoot you, regardless of whether I'm there or not. Let me talk to her. "

Dipping his head, he moved aside in order to let me pass. I took a deep breath, steeling myself. Facing the Colossus had been one thing. Convincing Tali to work with Legion would be a trial all on its own.

**.x.**


End file.
